Hansard Transcripts 1993-Oct-26 | Legislative Assembly of Ontario

Ms Dianne Poole (Eglinton): Today I rise on behalf of the Liberal caucus to salute our world champion Toronto Blue Jays. Who would have imagined on that snowy opening day at Exhibition Stadium some 16 years ago that our Jays would quickly go on to win five division titles and the World Series, and not only once but back-to-back World Series?

We've taken the Toronto Blue Jay heroes into our hearts and homes. Many of them have become household names -- Devo, Robbie, Joe, Johnny O, Tony, Eddie, Pat, Duane, Juan and Todd. We all know who they are.

But in winning this year's World Series there were some new heroes for us: Dave Stewart and, of course, MVP Paul Molitor, both of them class acts all the way. And what about that new kid on the block, Pat Hentgen, who won an amazing 20 games for the Jays this year, including crucial World Series game 3?

Above all, there's Cito Gaston. We all know he's the best manager in major league baseball, bar none. He's proven it two years in a row, no matter what the critics say. Thanks, Cito.

I thought it impossible to match the excitement of last year when my daughter Kathleen and I went to Atlanta to cheer on our Jays when they won Canada's first-ever World Series, but this year's team continued the dream. They stirred our patriotism and let us forget, at least for a few brief weeks, all our cares. For this we thank them, from coast to coast and from every part of Ontario.

As we go into withdrawal for the winter months, visions of sugarplums will dance in our heads. Next year, threepeat.

NORTH YORK PERFORMING ARTS CENTRE

Mr David Turnbull (York Mills): The official opening of the North York Performing Arts Centre on October 18 was a wonderful celebration which marked the coming of age of North York as a cultural community.

This gorgeous facility includes a main stage theatre, a recital hall and a small studio theatre.

The acoustics in the recital hall have received a top grade from Kerry Stratton, conductor of the North York Symphony Orchestra. In addition to housing the orchestra, the hall will attract other world-class concert artists such as the 83 international stars who are booked for this season.

The studio theatre, suitable for intimate performances, is the perfect space in which local performing artists can enhance their profile.

This $48-million structure is a state-of-the-art building in its innovation and design. The National Arts Centre in Ottawa is a comparable facility, yet using adjusted figures, the cost per seat in North York was only $16,000 as compared to over $50,000 in the nation's capital. Thus, our own centre is a testament to the way that the private and public sectors can work together to provide cost-effective solutions.

Who needs to go to New York when you can go to North York? Eat your heart out, Broadway.

POLITICAL PARTY LEADERS

Mrs Karen Haslam (Perth): I'm going to be quoting a column today called Queen's Park by Paula Todd, the title, "Leaders Struggle to Show They've Got the Right Stuff."

"Everything about Tory leader Mike Harris looks new -- his hair is longer, lighter, more swept, his suits bigger, broader, better tailored.

"His demeanour is improved too -- evidence, perhaps, that personality engineering is a viable science....

"McLeod, however, has more problems than Harris. To be fair, Harris had nowhere to go but up after a sorry start. But McLeod's still struggling to grab the attention and imagination of voters, not to mention party members....

"Ask yourself what the Liberals stand for under Lyn McLeod. If you have trouble answering -- most of us do -- it's a good sign that McLeod's opted for the lie-low-and-pray-this-trend-continues approach....

"As for Bob Rae...he looks burdened and serious and stern. Like a Premier who's into the work with both hands....

"Rae wants to demonstrate strong, steadfast leadership. Within a day of returning to the Legislature, he announced plans to impose new residency requirements on construction workers in Ontario and rules to prevent municipalities from buying buses made in Quebec. It's a direct assault on the Quebec regulations that prevent Ontarians from working there and favour Quebec bus purchases.

"Later, Rae took the lead in calling for an all-party national plan to attack Canada's economic crisis. He wants a think tank immediately after the October 25 federal election....

"'We need a national plan that deals with jobs and that gets the economy moving again really at every level,' he said.

"Rae is right, of course...As Harris and McLeod struggle to show they've got the stuff to lead Ontario, Rae's demonstrating he's got more -- provincial loyalty and national vision."

JOHN TORY

Mrs Elinor Caplan (Oriole): I'd like to extend a warm Ontario welcome to John Tory. Welcome home, John.

Ontario PCs have missed your input, your influence while you've been in Ottawa advising the federal leader and running the Tory election campaign.

I'm sure John Tory will now have lots of time to offer his advice to Mike Harris and Ontario's Conservatives. I know Mike Harris will be happy to have his old friend home. John Tory, Mike Harris welcomes you with open arms.

With the help of John Tory and the rest of the Big Blue Machine who are now back in Ontario, the Ontario Conservative caucus will gain from their valuable experience and advice now that their old friends are back home.

John Tory will be able to continue the work he did and plan advertising campaigns as he did for Kim Campbell, advertising campaigns that turned Ontarians and Canadians off.

I hope John Tory, Hugh Segal, Pat Kinsella and all the Big Blue Machine are able to convince Mike Harris that the Reform Party is not the way to go.

With John Tory back in Ontario, the next election will be worth waiting for.

A big welcome home to John Tory and the rest of the Big Blue Machine. I say thank you, Mr Speaker, for this opportunity to remind the Conservative caucus how important it is to be nice to their old friends. This is a sad day for them, but I think they've learned a lot and will be good advisers for Mike Harris.

HUSKY INJECTION MOLDING

Mr David Tilson (Dufferin-Peel): I'd like to inform the Legislature today of a business success story within my riding of Dufferin-Peel. Husky Injection Molding in Bolton has been honoured with the 1993 Canada Export Award. The award was presented to companies that have demonstrated ability and success in the global trading arena. Canadian exports have achieved record levels in 1992, continue to drive our economy in 1993 and lead the way to overcoming the global economic recession.

This award is the continued success in the story of Husky Injection Molding of Bolton. It started in 1953 as a small machine shop. Under the leadership of Robert Schad, Husky Injection Molding has grown to become one of the world's leading suppliers of injection molding equipment for the plastics industry. Husky produces everything from bottle caps to plastic cutlery to compact disc cases and has established itself in 61 countries throughout the world. Husky currently employs over 700 employees at its headquarters in Bolton, as well as an additional 400 in sales offices throughout the world.

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Husky's commitment to both its customers and its employees, through training and apprenticeship programs, has proven it to be a competitive company that has been able to consistently increase its sales records an average of 20% a year. Husky's success is not limited to sales, however. In the past five years alone, its workforce has increased by 24%. I would like to personally congratulate Husky Injection Molding upon receiving the 1993 Canada Export Award, and trust that members from all parties will acknowledge Husky's achievements and wish them continued future success.

MIDDLESEX FARM HIKER TOUR

Mrs Irene Mathyssen (Middlesex): I would like to report to the House that on Sunday, October 3, Middlesex farm families hosted the Annual Middlesex Farm Hiker Tour. In all, interested tour participants, an estimated 3,000-plus people, visited 10 locations and were able to see deer, beef, egg, sheep, dairy, apple, greenhouse, pork and cash crop operations.

I would like to congratulate the co-chairs of the event, Bill Irwin of North Dorchester township and Carolyn Murray of Westminster, as well as the Association for Food and Agricultural Awareness, the Middlesex Women in Support of Agriculture and the farm families and exhibitors of Middlesex who arranged and delivered a first-class tour for the people of London and Middlesex.

My family and I spent much of that Sunday afternoon visiting with friends and neighbours, sampling the best food that Ontario has to offer and enjoying farm tours.

Thanks to Elgin and Dorothy Vessie; Tom and Loretta Needham; Andy and Nancy Orosz; Ralph and Carol Stephen; Ron, Mary, Gerald and Jean Johnson; Jansen's Greenhouse; Huron Tractor; Pat and Susan Van Bommel; and of course Ernie Muzylowsky and family of Appleland for a superb event that allowed the urban constituents of London-Middlesex area to understand better the importance of agriculture in Ontario, the collective accomplishments of the rural community and the pride and dedication that keep farm families on the land to secure the safe, reliable food supply on which all of us, both urban and rural, depend.

SUPPORTS TO EMPLOYMENT PROGRAM

Mrs Yvonne O'Neill (Ottawa-Rideau): I'd like to bring to the attention of the House today the questionable cuts to the supports to employment program, which was the previous government's response to the Social Assistance Review Committee's report, Transitions.

This successful program is currently serving 93,000 Ontario recipients by bridging the transition to the workforce and, until they are established, maintaining some of the benefits of social assistance.

In some cases, the deduction of child care expenses is helpful. In others, disability-related work expenses are deducted. The purpose of STEP is to ensure that social assistance recipients are better off working.

For the second time in as many years, this NDP government has attacked this program by further reducing the exemption levels of net employment income, thus reducing the financial incentive to work, to get off the social assistance rolls. This takeaway in the STEP program is but another example of this NDP government cutting successes, cutting in this case personal successes.

I urge the Minister of Community and Social Services to rethink these cuts and to stop undermining the very programs which are attaining successful results for those Ontarians who are most in need.

PORNOGRAPHY

Mrs Margaret Marland (Mississauga South): This is White Ribbon Against Pornography Week. This week, people across Canada are wearing white ribbons to show their concern that the degradation and violence of pornography hurt individuals, families and communities.

Many studies link violent and explicit pornography to crime. An American forensic psychiatrist, Dr Park Eliot Dietz, finds that some troubled youth who view sexual violence as adolescents later become serial sex killers. There are also many studies that find a causal link between pornography and sexual assault.

Another disturbing conclusion by Dr James Check of York University is that children between the ages of 12 and 17 are the primary consumers of pornography in Canada.

But despite the growing evidence of the harmful effects of pornography, the Ontario Film Review Board wants to change its guidelines to allow more acts that are degrading, dehumanizing and possibly violent. Only after a public outcry did the OFRB decide not to allow sex videos to portray double penetration, the insertion of foreign objects, ejaculation on the face and bondage.

The OFRB must realize that its rating decisions do not reflect community standards. If they did, we would not have thousands of Ontarians writing letters of protest and joining community action groups. If they did, we would not have dozens of municipalities passing bylaws to keep X-rated video stores out of our communities.

We hope that eventually this government and the Ontario Film Review Board will understand once and for all what community standards really are in the province of Ontario.

CANCER PREVENTION

Ms Jenny Carter (Peterborough): I wish to speak to the importance of preventing cancer in this province. I commend the efforts of Peterborough's health unit and medical officer of health, Garry Humphries, for putting a great deal of energy and commitment into their anti-smoking campaign. The unit is working with the school boards to get the message into schools and is also working with other groups, such as the Lung Association, to talk to existing smokers in their workplaces. Major public buildings in Peterborough, including city hall and the Memorial Centre, are smoke-free.

I also find myself the target of a lobbying effort, and I appreciate that. I know Health minister Ruth Grier and her parliamentary assistant Larry O'Connor will be introducing tobacco legislation at the first opportunity.

Smoking is an obvious source of unnecessary cancer and other illnesses and of premature death. However, we must not forget that the horrendous, increasing incidence of cancer is not only a result of smoking but is also caused by carcinogenic chemicals in our workplaces and our larger environment.

Every sufferer must be cared for, and I appreciate efforts made recently in this House to bring forward the needs of individuals who require treatment. However, no health service financed by taxpayers is going to indefinitely be able to meet the needs of a society plagued by avoidable cancers.

I welcome the efforts of our Health minister and all anti-smoking campaigners. We must work on all fronts to prevent cancer. We know what many of its causes are. Let's get rid of them.

STATEMENTS BY THE MINISTRY AND RESPONSES

TEACHERS' DISPUTE

Hon David S. Cooke (Minister of Education and Training): Negotiations between the Lambton County Board of Education and the branch affiliate of the Ontario Secondary School Teachers' Federation have been under way for more than 22 months.

After taking several steps, including work-to-rule, the teachers went on strike in support of their demands on September 14, 1993. This strike is now in its 30th day. This is the second teachers' strike at the Lambton County Board of Education in the last three years.

Substantial progress has been made in negotiations. However, the parties have been unable to reach a final resolution of their collective agreement. In fact, both the teachers and the board tell us they are unable to reach an agreement on their own, that a legislated solution is necessary to bring the strike to an end.

Parents and teachers are very concerned about the strike and the effects it will have on students for the successful completion of their school year.

Last Friday, I met with representatives of the Education Relations Commission. They reported to me on the ERC's attempt to help the board and the teachers solve the dispute. This has included extensive discussions with the parties by field staff and information services staff of the commission. A fact-finder and a mediator were appointed. The commission's chief executive officer was involved in talks. Finally, a public inquiry was held on October 21, 1993.

Officials of the commission have told me that they saw little prospect for a negotiated settlement of this dispute in the near future. However, for the good of the students a resolution to this strike must be reached.

As a result of the commission's findings, I will be introducing legislation later this afternoon to enable classes to resume in the secondary schools of the Lambton county board. The legislation I'm introducing will provide a mechanism for the settlement of the items remaining in dispute between the board and its secondary school teachers.

The legislation will ensure the teachers return to work immediately. Teachers and the board will be asked to develop and submit a joint plan outlining how they will make up lost instruction time for students. If no settlement is reached within 15 days of royal assent to the legislation, the bill will give the teachers the opportunity to participate in a supervised vote on the last offer submitted to them by the board.

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This legislation has been designed to give the parties a period of time to design their own dispute resolution mechanism or come up with a collective agreement with a minimum term of three years. If neither of these objectives is completed within 40 days after royal assent to the bill is given, the government will impose a dispute resolution mechanism on the parties. The legislation will obligate the parties to file with me and the Education Relations Commission a proposal on how they have jointly agreed to improve their relationship by March 1, 1994.

The process we are recommending is based on the belief that any successful legislated resolution to the labour dispute must be designed to allow the parties to reach an agreement themselves after the strike has ended. It is based on the philosophy that the parties must be held responsible for both making and renewing collective agreements and the consequences resulting from their failure to do so.

Our government believes in the free collective bargaining process. It is always best for the parties involved in the collective agreement to reach their own solutions. But in this situation both parties, teachers and the board, have told us that the school year is in jeopardy and only a legislated solution will ensure that the year is not lost.

The parties will still have the opportunity to reach an agreement locally. That is our wish: for teachers and boards across the province to find local solutions to collective bargaining issues. In the meantime, students will be able to return to their classes.

I believe the legislation I will be introducing this afternoon affords both parties and the community the time and the opportunity to take steps to improve their relationship and to establish a sound labour relations process for the future.

Mr Charles Beer (York North): In response to the minister's statement, I want first of all to say that we believe, as he has pointed out, that the only solution at this time is to bring in legislation. As the minister has noted, both the school board and the union representatives have referred to that.

What we do have to underline, though, to the minister is that clearly what the minister is now having to bring in is back-to-work legislation and that the process of free collective bargaining has been dramatically affected by the steps he has had to take this afternoon.

I think there's one very critical thing that is missing from the minister's statement today, and that is, what are his proposals in terms of how we handle these kinds of situations in the future?

I want to refer to the minister a report from his own government, the Knott report, which was presented on March 29, 1993. That report, which was entitled Labour Relations Report -- Elementary and Secondary Education Sector, was the culmination of a series of negotiations and discussions with all of the main players in the education sector: the teachers' federations, the school boards, the Education Relations Commission, the Canadian Union of Public Employees and others.

Minister, I want you to go back within the term of your own government, where we have had other strike situations that went on for a very lengthy time and where, in particular, we are dealing with semestered schools. We know that when the original legislation was drafted and brought in, back in 1975, there were no semestered schools, or if there were at that time, there were very few.

All of the participants in Ontario in educational bargaining have, over the last couple of years, presented proposals around improvements to Bill 100. They have come from teachers' federations and school boards as well as the Education Relations Commission. The purpose in setting up the Knott committee was to look at those various recommendations and see what kinds of steps could be taken.

The critical factor, and it's set out in the Education Relations Commission's report and in the minister's statement itself, is that we have to be concerned about the students in the classroom and we have to determine in a much more effective way when the education of those students is in jeopardy.

What we needed from the minister today was not just a process in trying to resolve this strike. As I read what the minister has said, basically the legislation that he's bringing in will send the teachers back to the classroom but then allow for more discussion and a series of stages or steps in which it is still hoped there will be an agreement. We know we have the situation in East Parry Sound, we know we have other school board situations where, partly because of social contract discussions and the expenditure controls, there is a high probability that there will be other either work-to-rule or strike situations which we're going to face in this province.

We need to say, "Let's take a lot of the recommendations that have come forward from all of the stakeholders and see how we can improve the way that collective bargaining system works," because, as I said to the minister's predecessor a year and a half ago when the Carleton strike ended, if we really believe that free collective bargaining is the way we want this sector to operate, and we believe that is the way it should operate, then we, not just those of us in the Legislature but the teachers and the boards, have to ensure that we make that system work.

What we have seen in Lambton is a process that didn't work and where at the end of the day the students are in jeopardy. As the minister has pointed out, they've lost 30 days, and no matter what kind of plan is drawn up by next Monday, I think anyone who has ever been in a classroom and who has taught would recognize that it is going to be extremely difficult to make up all of that time.

I believe our obligation as legislators now is to say, "Look, school trustees, teachers' organizations, community representatives, let's sit down and see how we can improve that system," one that has worked reasonably well but which is showing some real flaws right now. If we don't deal with it, we are going to have more situations such as the one we've had in Lambton. Again, the guiding principle must be how can we best protect the rights of our sons and daughters who are in the elementary and secondary system and ensure that they get the kind of education they deserve.

Mrs Elizabeth Witmer (Waterloo North): I'd like to thank the minister for bringing in this legislation today. This is something that my colleague the critic, Mrs Cunningham, has been calling for. She has been most concerned about the fact that the students in Lambton county are in jeopardy, that they are going to be losing at least 30 days, and she has been calling for the minister to make this type of recommendation we see here today.

Given the social contract and the fiscal restraints, however, one has to wonder why the students in the system in Lambton county were forced to be out of school for 30 days, and that's something we certainly have not seen answered today.

I believe this has everything to do with the social contract. The Premier had indicated previously that everyone was supposed to be treated equally. However, if this now goes to arbitration, in the absence of arbitration guidelines the potential is there for an increase that is far beyond what was said would occur under the social contract guidelines, and yet everybody else in this province has had their wages either frozen or cut.

There are certainly some serious questions which are left unanswered concerning the entire process that has taken place in Lambton county. I would concur with the remarks that have been made by my colleague for the Liberal Party: It is time for all of us to sit down and to make sure that we avoid a situation such as the one we have experienced in Lambton county. We need to always keep uppermost in our minds the students who have been put in jeopardy because they have lost 30 days.

Mr Ernie L. Eves (Parry Sound): I'd just like to make a few comments about the legislation today. I think it's a sad state of affairs when we have to have students anywhere in this province lose 30 days out of their education before we have a government or an Education Relations Commission that has the intestinal fortitude to do something on behalf of the students.

I always thought the education system was there for the benefit of students, not for the egos of board members or for the pockets of teachers. I thought an education system was there to serve the students, to educate students. The member for York North and the member for Waterloo North make some very valid points. Why do we have to wait for 30 days of lost education of students in our system before somebody gets it in their head that they should take action and do what's fair to the students, which is what the education system is supposed to be all about?

I want to point out that the strike in East Parry Sound is now into its 13th day and I would assume you're not going to wait 30 days there. Perhaps you'll learn by this mistake and take some pre-emptive action to do something for the students of the province: not the teachers, not the board members -- the students. I keep coming back to that, because apparently you haven't grasped it over there.

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I also would like to point out that this legislation is somewhat different from two previous ministers of Education, the Honourable Mr Conway in the Wellington county strike and the Honourable Bette Stephenson in the Leeds-Grenville strike. They spelled out in legislation their dispute-settling mechanism. The minister says in this legislation that he'll reserve and he'll let us know by some order in council or regulation: "I'm not going to spell it out in legislation how I'm going to do it." Be upfront and honest with the people you're dealing with.

Mr Chris Stockwell (Etobicoke West): With this piece of legislation the government is asking for today, as I understand it, the government is looking to order the teachers back to work. They would like first, second, third reading and royal assent. To me, that sounds like bang, bang, bang, bang. It just took them a few months to understand it.

The Speaker (Hon David Warner): It is now time for oral questions; the honourable Leader of the Opposition.

Applause.

Interjections.

The Speaker: All this, and you haven't even said anything.

ORAL QUESTIONS

JOB CREATION

Mrs Lyn McLeod (Leader of the Opposition): Last night, there was a jobs referendum in this province. The NDP's shutout in the province of Ontario gave a very clear message that the people of this province are simply fed up with this government's complete mismanagement of jobs and the economy. Premier, did you get the message? When are you going to put jobs and the economy at the top of your agenda?

Hon Bob Rae (Premier): I would certainly agree that the federal Liberal campaign that culminated in last night's election was an exceptionally well-managed campaign.

Let me say in all seriousness to the Leader of the Opposition in response to her question that I had a brief and constructive conversation with the Prime Minister-elect yesterday evening, in which I said to him that we look forward to working in partnership with him on a national infrastructure program and on a national jobs program.

I'd put a challenge to the former government to match us in terms of what we were prepared to do, and we had nothing from the previous administration but neglect, maladministration and completely ignoring the interests of the province of Ontario with respect to jobs and with respect to the infrastructure.

The federal Liberal Party has told us that it will be a new day in terms of cooperation with this province. I can tell the honourable minister that we look forward to their cooperation with us in terms of rapid transit, in terms of sewer and water, in terms of the work that's under way in Jobs Ontario Community Action, Jobs Ontario Homes, the trade centre and the airport. We are ready, we are moving, we're ready to go, we're going, and we want the federal Liberal Party to come with us and we want you to make sure it's joining us. These jobs are under way, and now we've got to get this government on side.

Mrs McLeod: We had understood earlier today that the Premier was ready to go. In fact, we understand he has said that he really does hope that some time within the next very few days he would be able to establish his jobs agenda. Premier, the question in everybody's mind is, where have you been for the last three years? We all saw the leaked memo from your office about a month ago, in which your communications staff advised that you should have a jobs agenda as a re-election strategy. It seems that after last night, the Premier does have to be concerned about one job in particular, and that's his own.

But quite beyond the partisanship of the night after an election, there is a very serious issue about jobs in this province. I say to the Premier that 11,000 more layoffs and job losses have already been announced for the coming months. They include 73 jobs at Mallory Controls in Woodstock, 83 jobs at Muller's Meats in Niagara and 60 jobs at Boeing in Arnprior. I ask you in all seriousness, what did these kinds of cold numbers say to you about your failure, not the federal government's failure but your failure, to deal with this province's economy? When will you understand that it is your government?

The Speaker (Hon David Warner): Could the leader conclude her question.

Mrs McLeod: Premier, when will you understand that it is your government, your government's mismanagement, that is responsible for the jobs that are being lost across this province?

Hon Mr Rae: I'm sure the new federal government will be dealing with the free trade issue, I'm sure it'll be dealing with the GST and I'm sure it'll be dealing with John Crow. All those are factors which they themselves have identified in their little red book as being the critical reasons why the economy has been in such difficulty; those are the reasons they identified as being problematic.

I say directly to the honourable member, where has she been when we've announced Jobs Ontario Capital programs worth nearly $4 billion this year alone? When it comes to highway construction, we've already let more contracts in the first six months of this year than were ever done in the history of the province of Ontario. That's what the New Democratic Party government has been doing. Where have you been?

Where has she been on Jobs Ontario Training? You want to cancel a $1-billion training program in the province of Ontario; we want to get the federal government involved in giving us our fair share so it's not all going to other parts of the country instead of coming to Ontario. Are you going to be fighting for Ontario with your new federal colleagues, with your 98 colleagues who are up there in Ottawa, making sure they deliver? We're going to be making sure they deliver. Are you, when it comes to making sure the federal government delivers on its promises to the people in the province of Ontario? What are you going to be doing?

Interjections.

The Speaker: Order. The Leader of the Opposition with her final supplementary.

Mrs McLeod: It seemed to me that the people of this province said last night they wanted a government to have a plan for jobs and economic recovery. Premier, here's your plan: This is all you've given the people of Ontario; this is your plan for the next two years, your legislative agenda. There's nothing here about jobs; there's nothing here to get the economy going again. All there is here is some new taxes, and that's exactly what the people of this province voted against last night when they sent people like Mike Breaugh and Steven Langdon and Howard McCurdy walking.

Premier, listen to what people said when they voted last night. It's the same thing that people have been saying when they write to us -- I keep trying to make their voices heard in this Legislature -- like the person from north of Toronto who writes and says, "NDP policies are killing my business," or the small business person in eastern Ontario who has said, "These new taxes could literally ruin my business," or the retailer in Kingston who says: "Why doesn't the NDP help instead of killing off small business? We have to cut our staff again."

Premier, what do you have to say to these very real people? How do you explain your $3-billion tax increase to these people who are losing their businesses and losing their jobs? Why don't you get the message that people sent you last night?

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Hon Mr Rae: The honourable member is talking about the experience of taxes that the people of this province have suffered from. Every business person I talk to, every small business person I talk to, says to me, "Premier, we know you didn't create this problem, we know you're struggling to deal with it effectively and we know that what you've had to do is nothing compared to the employer health tax, the increase in the sales tax, the increase in the regulatory burden brought out by the Liberal Party, the tire tax, the commercial concentration tax." Which party abolished the commercial concentration tax? The New Democratic Party of Ontario, our government. Which party abolished the tire tax? The New Democratic Party of Ontario.

I can tell the honourable member, we are going to be working with the business community and we're going to be working with the new federal government to make sure we get things moving in this country together. We're going to do it by working cooperatively and we're going to be doing it by defending the interests of this part of Ontario, which have too long been neglected by our federal governments.

I look forward to that change and I'm sure I'll have the support of the honourable member when we want to get rid of the cap on CAP. I hope she'll be there when we want to end discrimination in training programs. I hope she'll be there when we want to deal with real tax reform. I hope she'll be there when we want to get them involved in terms of new highway construction and new infrastructure. I hope she'll be there, because I know where we're going to be: fighting for the people of Ontario, faced with the kind of --

The Speaker: Would the Premier conclude his response, please.

Mrs McLeod: It seems to me I heard a lot of those same words in the first speech from the throne. The people of this province hope the Premier will actually deliver this time.

WORKERS' COMPENSATION BOARD

Mrs Lyn McLeod (Leader of the Opposition): My second question is also to the Premier. This time I want to turn to the issue of mismanagement, and in particular our continued concerns with mismanagement at the Workers' Compensation Board. We recall the fact that the New Democratic Party members on the public accounts committee quashed a further review of the auditor's special report into the now infamous WCB building; they deferred consideration of this auditor's report until some time after the next election. Then the vice-chair of the Workers' Compensation Board, Brian King, who, Premier, is your appointment, decided to attack the auditor's credibility before the public accounts committee.

The auditor has now released a letter outlining what he calls misleading and factual errors that were made by Mr King in his testimony. Premier, have you read the auditor's letter? Have you listened and heard his allegations? Can you tell us whether you continue to have confidence in the management of the Workers' Compensation Board?

Hon Bob Rae (Premier): I can tell the honourable member that I have been meeting over the last several months with leaders of the business community and leaders of the trade union movement in an effort to reform and improve the work of the Workers' Compensation Board. We have been doing everything we can to make sure the board acts efficiently and fairly and recognizes the need for change.

In direct response to the honourable member, I can say that I continue to have a great deal of confidence in Mr King, who's wrestling with some very difficult issues and is a man of great integrity and great ability.

Mrs McLeod: Premier, I asked specifically whether you had read the auditor's letter, because I believe in that letter there are very serious concerns raised that should cause you to have some doubts in the management of the Workers' Compensation Board.

Mr King, when he appeared before the public accounts committee, said that the auditor's report was merely subjective. He also claimed that the auditor refused to provide a legal opinion on the financial transactions that were being made by the WCB. The auditor responds in his letter: "Mr King's allegation is not factually correct. Under the Audit Act, I am precluded from providing the legal opinion."

Premier, I wonder how you can continue to support the WCB's management when the WCB management is ducking its own responsibilities by falsely blaming the auditor for its own lack of accountability.

Hon Mr Rae: There may well be a difference of opinion between Mr King and the auditor. That, to me, is something we'll all have to respond to. But the reality of what Mr King is saying about the management of the board and about our determination to act fairly and with integrity -- Mr King is somebody who's managed the worker compensation board in other provinces. He's an injured worker himself. He's somebody whose appointment was recommended by Dr Elgie, who was a former chairman of the board and a former minister in the Conservative government. I would say to the honourable member, I think Mr King is a person who's acting to deal with a very difficult situation and is acting with a great deal of integrity.

Mrs McLeod: I'm asking the Premier to deal specifically with the issue of Mr King's appearance in front of the public accounts committee and the refusal of the NDP members on the public accounts committee to deal with the very serious allegations of a lack of accountability on the part of the WCB.

The Premier knows, as we surely all know, that this is really a financial crisis situation that the Workers' Compensation Board is facing in the province of Ontario. I'm sure he hears that everywhere, as I do, the fact that there's an $11-billion unfunded liability and that that liability is growing by more than $1 million a day. It is absolutely imperative that people have some confidence that the WCB is being appropriately and well managed.

I suggest to the Premier, and again I say, that Mr King is his political appointment and that all Mr King has done is to try to blame the problems on the auditor. He went so far in his statements before the public accounts committee as to somehow claim that the auditor had given the go-ahead for the new WCB building, based on a previous audit that had been done. The auditor in his letter today says very clearly that at the time he did the previous audit, he couldn't possibly have known about the Workers' Compensation Board's plans to go ahead with its new building. He couldn't possibly have given them the go-ahead.

Premier, I don't know how you can continue to have confidence in the management of the Workers' Compensation Board, and I ask you what you are now prepared to do about the misinformation and mismanagement that is coming from the WCB.

Hon Mr Rae: Let me again just say to the leader -- I know she won't want to hear this -- every observer I talk to, in the business community and in the labour community, tells me and others who look at it that they were promised -- Bill 162 was supposed to be fiscally neutral. That was the legislation brought forward by her colleague who's sitting just down the hall from her. I would say to her that the evidence has been overwhelming that Bill 162 has not been fiscally neutral, that it's been financially enormously expensive for the board and that it has caused enormous problems in terms of the overall plan. So what we're having to deal with now, I would say to the honourable member very directly, is with the consequences of that.

What we have said to the parties is this: It's not a matter of personalities; it's a matter of looking at the overall structure, the legislative foundation of the board and our understanding that reform is required and necessary. But we very much want to get the parties owning the problem and taking some joint responsibility for it, since they are responsible for managing the board and they are responsible for financing the board. That's what we've asked them to do, and we're continuing to work on a priority basis. Even this week I'll be meeting again with people about this issue and we continue to follow it with a great sense of urgency.

The Speaker (Hon David Warner): New question, third party, the leader of the third party.

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Mr Michael D. Harris (Nipissing): Perhaps, Mr Speaker, you would permit me 10 seconds to offer congratulations to the McLeod-Chrétien Liberals in their great victory last night and our very best wishes, firstly on behalf of our caucus, for the very difficult challenge they're going to have in governing Canada.

Having said that, I wish to ask a question of the Premier. I want to follow up with a question that was raised by the leader of the Liberal Party, to wit, last week the letter to the Chair of the standing committee on government agencies where the Provincial Auditor made very serious allegations against the vice-chair of the WCB, Mr Brian King.

Aside from the responses so far, we all agree labour and management are very concerned about reforms at WCB, but quite frankly they don't have confidence in the leadership to be able to carry it out and this is increasingly becoming a problem.

The auditor wrote, "We now find that in September 1993, Mr King challenges the objectivity of our report and attributes actions or statements to me which are not factual and which I am duty-bound to correct."

Premier, this is a very serious charge made by the Provincial Auditor of this province against one of your personal appointments to the WCB. I ask you very directly today, in light of this, why have you not come to the Legislature today informing us that you have asked for Mr King's resignation?

Hon Mr Rae: Because I believe in fairness in terms of public administration. There is a difference of opinion between the auditor and the vice-chair of the Workers' Compensation Board with respect to certain events. I don't think there's anything untoward in that. I don't think there's anything necessarily horrendous in that. I think there are some issues of public administration with which we have to deal.

I can say to the honourable member I think Mr King ought to be allowed to respond to the auditor's letter, which he was sent a copy of, I understand, the letter that was sent to his colleague from Oakville. I think he ought to be entitled to respond to it, which is what I intend to do.

Mr Harris: The only person who hasn't had a chance to respond, because he has been barred by the majority of your committee, is the auditor. He now has to take to writing letters. Brian King was your handpicked choice to manage the WCB. His defence of the $180-million imperial headquarters has been in question from day one. Now we have the Provincial Auditor alleging that Mr King knowingly or through incompetence misled a committee of this Legislature.

Premier, this is unprecedented. Do you not see that, given Mr King's total disregard for the elected members of this Legislature, for a duly appointed committee of this Legislature, you really have no choice but to ask for Mr King's resignation and to ask for it today? Will you do that?

Hon Mr Rae: No, I would have thought the choice was clear. I would have thought the choice would be to make it clear that we ought to give Mr King a chance to respond to some of the things that were said in the letter by the Provincial Auditor and understand that, as I say, there's clearly a difference of opinion between these two gentlemen.

Mr Harris: This is just the latest of a series of bad-news stories that have been coming out of the WCB. They have an unfunded liability of some $12 billion and growing. Some businesses just found out they're facing rate hikes of 75%, then this building, and now this. Obviously what Mr King is doing is not working and there is a tremendous lack of confidence (a) in his ability to lead and now (b) in his respect for the elected members and a committee of this Legislature.

I suggest this to you, Premier: It is time that you stop playing political games with someone else's money and that you, for the first time since I've been elected, as the Premier of this province stop using the WCB as a dumping ground for political hacks and friends of whatever party. Will you immediately revoke the political patronage jobs at WCB, will you throw out this incompetent team of management and will you bring in professional, experienced insurance executives to turn things around at the WCB?

Hon Mr Rae: I always consider the source, and luckily I have a memory. I can recall the WCB and its administration with some personal intimacy over the years, and I can't recall a government that was more determined to exercise political patronage over every senior appointment during the last 25 years of its administration.

Mr King, on the other hand, if I may say so --

Mr Harris: He was fired out of Manitoba for incompetence; an NDP hack who left Manitoba for bankrupting their system.

Hon Mr Rae: -- is somebody who came to the Workers' Compensation Board having worked for two other boards, having managed two other boards and, as I say, having been the person who was most highly recommended to us by a search committee that was chaired by Dr Bob Elgie, the former chair --

Mr Harris: Another political hack appointment that we were trying to do away with.

The Speaker: Order.

Hon Mr Rae: You describe Dr Bob Elgie as "a political hack appointment." Those are words which you can use to describe your former colleague, which, I can tell you, I would never use. Bob Elgie is a man of integrity, he's a man of outstanding ability, and he represents a far finer Tory tradition than you'll ever dream of or know of in this province. Unbelievable.

The Speaker: New question, the leader of the third party.

Mr Harris: Obviously, Premier, you have not understood the message that was delivered yesterday in the election. Bob Elgie was a political appointment --

The Speaker: And a new question.

Mr Harris: -- and the public is saying, "We don't want political appointments; we want professional management." He was appointed to the political job. We're talking about --

The Speaker: Is this the leader's second question?

Mr Harris: -- saying that it is the top civil service job, not the political job, and that is a big difference.

Mr James J. Bradley (St Catharines): I heard the word "hack."

Mr Harris: If he wasn't a political hack, what was he? Have you not heard anything the public's been telling you for the last three years?

The Speaker: Could the leader place his second question?

CORPORATION FILING PROGRAM

Mr Michael D. Harris (Nipissing): My second question is to the Premier as well. Last spring, Premier, as part of your multibillion-dollar grab, you imposed an annual filing fee of $50 on all corporations in Ontario. Even though the legislation to allow you to do this has not yet been passed, you have threatened now to dissolve over 18,000 Ontario businesses for not filing this year.

We all know the only reason you imposed the annual filing is because you saw the dollar signs. A filing fee is NDP jargon for a tax, and we all know that this grabbing an additional $10.5 million every year is the real reason you added to the already exhaustive paperwork and costs placed on our Ontario small businesses.

Premier, will you cease and desist this harassment of small business, withdraw this bill and this ill-conceived $50 tax on the small businesses of Ontario?

Hon Bob Rae (Premier): I'm going to refer this to the minister responsible, the Minister of Consumer and Commercial Relations.

Hon Marilyn Churley (Minister of Consumer and Commercial Relations): All other jurisdictions require annual filings, and the fees that we're charging are comparable across the country.

It was the Tory government in the 1970s that eliminated this annual return. It may have made sense at the time, but what happened is that the database, as a result of that decision, is in complete disarray. Every other jurisdiction in Canada requires the special filing once a year in order for this database to be publicly accessible, and it is necessary for these companies to make sure that the database is complete and in order.

Mr Harris: You were so desperate for cash in your last budget that you even hit non-profit corporations with a $25 filing fee. As a result, you have now threatened to dissolve 850 organizations in this province, such as the Victorian Order of Nurses, the Timmins Police Association, the Optimists Club of Whitby, Palmerston and District Hospital Foundation, the Human Rights and Racial Equality Association of Hamilton and Region, the Kinsmen Club of Fort Frances, the Kiwanis Club of Orangeville, the Network for Single Mothers of Ontario.

Minister, are you and your Premier and your Treasurer and your government so starved for cash that you actually intend to dissolve some of the most respected non-profit organizations in Ontario for $25?

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Hon Ms Churley: No. The issue here is that all of these people will be sent letters clarifying to them that they must, they absolutely must, under the law, give us the information once a year that is needed. For non-profit corporations, it costs $25 a year to make sure that the database is in order and we have the correct information which is on the public file. We have sent a letter to those companies that did not comply last year urging them to get their records in order and to pay this year. Nobody is taking away their status. We are letting them know, once again, that they have to pay that fee and they have to send in their information, but of course we're not taking away their status.

Mr Harris: My caucus has launched a task force on cutting red tape in growing small businesses. We are hearing over and over and over again that regulation and paperwork is one of the greatest concerns of business in Ontario. In fact, they estimate now they spend one day a week dealing with government paperwork and regulation.

Let's face it, the only reason for this filing fee is to grab another $10.5 million -- we all know that -- so you can have information that's good enough to sell at the other end and collect even more money. We all know that.

I would ask you this: Why would your government not be up front, call it a tax, because that is what it is, and instead of saddling businesses with another $50 to $100 worth of paperwork to pay the $50 tax, why don't you be more honest about it and levy it through the normal tax channels if that's what you want to do?

Hon Ms Churley: The leader of the third party has got it all wrong. He's got it completely wrong once again. This is an annual return that takes place in every other province, with a fee attached. What he also has wrong is his analysis of what this government is doing about small business. This is the government that is finally tackling the red tape that the two parties across the floor created for small business. We are in the process of coming up with unified tax reporting. This has never been done before. We are in the process of cutting red tape all over the place through all the ministries, which his government in the past created and the Liberals in their time created more and more of. He shouldn't mix the two. We are improving the situation, and the small businesses out there know that.

HEALTH SERVICES

Mrs Lyn McLeod (Leader of the Opposition): My question is for the Minister of Health. Minister, when your government embarked on the social contract, you personally made a commitment that vital health care services would not be hurt as a result of that social contract. Minister, I ask you today, what did you do to ensure in fact that critical health care services would not be affected? Did you take time to look at areas that, for example, were experiencing shortages of personnel or long waiting lists? Did you consider whether special arrangements or exceptions would have to be made in order to protect services in critical health areas?

Hon Ruth Grier (Minister of Health): I think, as the member knows, that certainly in some areas and with the regulations that were promulgated with respect to the social contract the definition of "critical function" was there so that as the social contract is implemented by the various institutions they have the opportunity to implement it in different ways depending on the needs and the critical functions that are performed.

Mrs McLeod: That is hardly accepting responsibility for ensuring that the social contract would not jeopardize access to essential health care. I do not believe that Mrs Elinor Read would be very reassured by the minister's response. Mrs Read went to the Bayview cancer centre for her appointment on October 5. She was told that her appointment was cancelled, that it would have to be rescheduled. In fact, Minister, Mrs Read was told, "Bob Rae has shut this place down."

In order to deal with the social contract's impact on its funding, the Bayview centre for cancer treatment has shut down for one day in October and will be shutting down for another day in November. This clinic sees 360 patients a day. You know, and you have known for a long time, that we are facing some very real problems in access to cancer care and treatment. I ask, did you even consider what the impact of the social contract would be on cancer care in this province? How could you possibly have allowed a problem to get even worse?

Hon Mrs Grier: I reject the allegation that the social contract has impacted on medically necessary services. The social contract allows institutions to attempt to manage their administration in a way that both reduces compensation payments and protects jobs and maintains services.

Interjections.

The Speaker (Hon David Warner): Order. The member for Halton Centre, order.

Hon Mrs Grier: I know, as the Leader of the Opposition has said, that anybody who disagrees with anything this government does says it's because of the social contract. I'm aware of somebody in an elevator who, when the door didn't shut in a hospital, said, "The elevators don't work because of the social contract."

But cancer, cancer treatment and dealing with the long-standing issue of how to provide adequate treatment --

Interjections.

The Speaker: Order. The member for Etobicoke West, come to order.

Hon Mrs Grier: -- in this province for cancer patients is a priority and continues --

Interjections.

The Speaker: Minister?

The honourable member for Markham.

SOCIAL CONTRACT

Mr W. Donald Cousens (Markham): This question is for the Minister of Finance. On three separate occasions, I requested from you and your staff the opportunity to review the social contract agreements. On July 20, in a meeting with representatives from your ministry, I asked for an opportunity to look at the contracts. On July 29, I filed an order paper question requesting information. In the week of August 3, my office requested an opportunity to review the contracts once more. Each request has been denied.

What are you hiding, and when will you release all the social contracts to myself and the public for viewing?

Hon Floyd Laughren (Minister of Finance): I am aware of the requests that have been made by the member for Markham. The problem is not because we are attempting to hide anything from the member. I suspect there's nothing in those contracts with which the member for Markham would find fault. Of course, I don't want to prejudge that, but I doubt it.

The problem is that there are something like -- and don't hold me precisely to this number -- 7,000 contracts that have been sent in to the Ministry of Finance flowing from the social contract. They vary from full legal documents to a typewritten page, a resolution or motion passed by, for example, a municipal council. You can imagine that as we attempt to control the cost of the public service, we simply can't go out and hire 1,000 people to peruse those documents. So the Ministry of Finance people are plowing through them to make sure they do comply with the requirements of the Social Contract Act. That's the only reason, that they haven't finished doing that themselves yet. That's the only reason. We think we owe that to the people who send them in, to at least peruse them before we start distributing them.

Mr Cousens: The Ministry of Finance's refusal to allow us to look at these documents really speaks volumes. It's a form of censorship, because what you're doing is preventing us from looking at important information while it's still useful and still meaningful, not unlike the Cold War in Europe where you had a Berlin Wall and people put up all kinds of protection so that people couldn't see what was going on, to protect evidence from the real world. It's a news blackout that you're giving us, and we're just not allowed to get through the propaganda machine of you, your ministry and the government.

We want to see those documents. The public has a right to know what deals were struck and how these deals will impact both the private and public sectors. Again I ask you: When will you release the details of the contracts to myself and the public?

Hon Mr Laughren: All I'm saying to the member for Markham -- and I appreciate his request and his interest in this matter; I'm not being at all critical in that regard -- is, give us a chance to look at those 7,000 contracts before we start distributing them. As soon as we can get our officials plowed through them, who are plowing through them now to have a look at them --

Mr Cousens: Give us a date.

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Hon Mr Laughren: I'm not going to give the member for Markham a date, because I don't know precisely when that'll be. That group is working extremely hard to analyse all of the documents, because you've got --

Mr Cousens: Next month? Next year?

The Speaker (Hon David Warner): Order. The member for Markham.

Mr Cousens: In 1993? I want an answer to my question.

The Speaker: Will the member for Markham come to order, please.

Interjections.

Hon Mr Laughren: I am trying to answer the question of the member for Markham, but he's making it difficult.

We're not trying to be obstructionist with the member for Markham, who has a genuine interest in this matter, I believe. All I'm asking him is to give us a chance to go through those 7,000-odd documents before we start distributing to the public. If, for example, there was something in one of them that we wish to have clarified or corrected, surely we have an obligation to get back to the people who sent them in before we start distributing them widely to the public. That's the only reason why we're not distributing now.

COCHLEAR IMPLANTS

Mr Gary Malkowski (York East): I have a question for the Minister of Health. The provision of $1.7 million as base funding to six hospitals to implement a cochlear implant program has been approved as of April 1993.

There are only 52 patients who will receive cochlear implants this year in Ontario. The Canadian Hearing Society and the Ontario Association of the Deaf want to know how the Ministry of Health made this decision to fund the cochlear implant project. Are there any research studies on cochlear implants on deaf children, possibly including longitudinal studies and evaluative measures, and has there been any consultation with the Canadian Hearing Society, the Ontario Association of the Deaf, Voice for Hearing Impaired Children and implant consumers?

Hon Ruth Grier (Minister of Health): There are a number of questions there, and let me say that I know of this member's intense interest in this particular subject.

In response to his question, yes, there are studies available on the pros and cons of cochlear implants, but I'm also very well aware that there is a real debate within the deaf community as to the merits of this procedure.

Adults and children in Ontario have been going to the United States for both the procedure and for rehabilitation, and in consideration as to whether this service ought to be provided in Ontario, a working group was established. There was representation from the Canadian Hearing Society, and that group made recommendations with respect to the criteria for eligibility of candidates as well as how provincial programs should be implemented.

For that reason and in response to the fact that there was an identified need, we have committed $1.7 million to a provincial program. That program is available in Ontario, with an emphasis on the freedom of people to choose whether or not to have the procedure and a responsibility to make them aware that there is a debate and there are pros and cons.

Mr Malkowski: There are deaf organizations such as the World Federation of the Deaf, the Canadian Hearing Society and the Ontario Association of the Deaf that are raising serious concerns about experimentation on deaf children because of the medical, social and emotional risks these young, deaf children face because of the childhood implants.

Will you assure parents of deaf children and the deaf community that your ministry officials will establish a system to assess the costs, the benefits and the risks of childhood implants as well as providing parents with full information, including potential medical, social and emotional risks of the implants?

Hon Mrs Grier: I want to assure the member that the ministry will continue to work with all of the stakeholders, including the hospitals and members of the deaf community, to ensure that the risks that I know the member is very aware of and with which he has made me familiar are avoided. Upon the request of the ministry, the Sunnybrook Medical Centre is coordinating the provincial program, and that will include providing staff education when requested, developing and maintaining a data system for implant candidates, organizing regular information meetings and evaluating the program once it has been operational for a reasonable period of time, which could mean in about two years, and at our request and in response to the concern of the member we have requested that the hospital develop an information kit for persons who are cochlear implant candidates so that they are aware that there is debate and that there are varying degrees of opinion about the merits of this particular procedure.

MUNICIPAL LEGISLATION

Mr Bernard Grandmaître (Ottawa East): My question is to the Minister of Municipal Affairs and it's concerning his announcement in Ottawa-Carleton last week concerning Bill 77, "Philip Can't Wait for Reform." Mr Minister, why would you want to ram Bill 77 through? Why can't you allow this House to debate Bill 77? You delayed the introduction of the legislation, you purposely delayed second reading of Bill 77 in this House, you didn't have the decency to make an announcement in this House -- you made it outside -- and now you will be limiting debate on Bill 77 to one hour.

Mr Minister, tell me the truth: Why would you want to ram this bill through?

Hon Ed Philip (Minister of Municipal Affairs): I don't quite know what the honourable member is talking about. What we did last week was publish the boundaries that had been arrived at by a committee set up of clerks of the municipalities. Indeed, the chair of the region of Ottawa-Carleton was quite complimentary of the excellent jobs that have been done, and I would think he would want his constituents, be they elected to a municipality or considering election, to know what those boundaries that have been arrived at are as early as possible so they could make democratic decisions as to whether or not they were going to seek office, and if so, where.

Mr Grandmaître: Minister, you're saying you want to make the people in Ottawa-Carleton aware. Why won't you make this House aware of what you intend to do in Ottawa-Carleton? We want to know. Now you want to limit debate to one hour in this House. This is very unfair, because you know people in Ottawa-Carleton are very concerned about this piece of legislation. I should say 10 of the 11 mayors are opposed. You're excluding the mayors from sitting on regional council. You challenged the mayors of Ottawa-Carleton to give you options to include the mayors on regional council. You didn't even have the decency to respond to those three options.

Mr Minister, come clean. Why would you exclude the mayors from regional council? Is this the way you will treat regional governments in the province of Ontario? Again, I'm asking you, why are you ramming this bill through?

Hon Mr Philip: The members of the Liberal Party like to have it both ways. Some of their members from the Ottawa-Carleton area are urging me to get on with the bill because they'd like to have the bill through the House as soon as possible.

Mr James J. Bradley (St Catharines): Name names.

The Speaker (Hon David Warner): Order.

Hon Mr Philip: Mr Speaker, the member obviously doesn't want an answer, because he insists on drowning me out.

Mr Noble Villeneuve (S-D-G & East Grenville): They are asking which riding they are from. Which riding are they from, Ed?

The Speaker: While it would help for all members to listen to the reply, it would also help if the minister would direct his response to the Chair.

Mr Robert Chiarelli (Ottawa West): Name the members who support it.

The Speaker: The member for Ottawa West, please come to order.

Hon Mr Philip: Mr Speaker, maybe it would do well for the honourable member to protect the democratic rights of the people of Ottawa-Carleton who want representation by population -- that's a democratic principle -- rather than standing up for certain mayors who happen to be friends of his.

The Speaker: New question, the member for Lanark-Renfrew.

Mr Grandmaître: Come clean.

Hon Mr Philip: On a point of order, Mr Speaker: Some of those mayors are not friends of his.

Mr Norman W. Sterling (Carleton): On a point of order, Mr Speaker: I don't think any of the mayors are friends of his.

The Speaker: I'm not sure who's friends with whom, but the member for Lanark-Renfrew has the floor.

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ALGONQUIN PROVINCIAL PARK

Mr Leo Jordan (Lanark-Renfrew): My question is for the Minister of Natural Resources. Mr Minister, with regard to the negotiation process with the Algonquin of Golden Lake natives, I would like you to tell this House what will be done with Algonquin Park. Will you confirm that Algonquin Park will remain under provincial authority, provincial control and provincial ownership?

Hon Howard Hampton (Minister of Natural Resources): The member asks a question which I know is of some interest to people in eastern Ontario. I think it's important to emphasize that the kinds of discussions the Ministry of Natural Resources has had with the Algonquins of Golden Lake have been discussions to exercise hunting rights and resource harvesting of that type.

The member may be referring, in part, to the land claim which the Algonquins of Golden Lake have also put to the government of Ontario and the government of Canada. That is a matter on which discussions are ongoing and on which I think it would be premature, at this point in time, to raise any issue.

Mr Jordan: According to a letter from Mrs Amos of Chiblow Lake Lodge, the minister for native affairs has stated that comanagement is alive and well in Algonquin Park. From this statement, it appears that the fate of Algonquin Park has been decided without consultation and that comanagement is a done deal.

Your government's stated objective in these negotiations is to ensure the integrity of Algonquin Park as a provincial park under continuing provincial ownership and control. Will you explain why the minister for native affairs is contradicting this statement in saying that comanagement is well and alive?

Hon Mr Hampton: The member opposite may want to try to find a contradiction there; in fact, he may try very hard to find a contradiction there. The reality is that we have provincial parks in Ontario where the Ministry of Natural Resources and a nearby first nation cooperate, for example, in managing entry to a park and with respect to other issues that go on in a park.

We believe we can show that comanagement of a variety of resources can be made to work in Ontario without jeopardizing the integrity of our parks, without jeopardizing the integrity of our natural resources. If the member chooses to find a contradiction in that, I'm sorry to have to say to him that I think he's quite wrong. We believe we can work out cooperative management strategies in a number of locations.

PROPOSED TRADE CENTRE

Mr Anthony Perruzza (Downsview): My question is to the Minister of Economic Development and Trade. Because I represent a riding that has a lot of unemployed construction workers, my question to you is, what do you see happening with the national trade centre in Metro and the potential construction jobs to be created by that now that the previous Tory government, which refused to support this project, has been replaced?

Hon Frances Lankin (Minister of Economic Development and Trade): I appreciate the question from the member. It's obviously a very timely question and an important one. I point out that the national trade centre, along with the Metro convention centre, because there are two projects in fact in a package that we have proposed funding for, are projects we would like to see proceed. We have cooperation from the Metro level of government. They would like to see this proceed.

Immediately after the writs for the federal election were announced, unfortunately, the federal Tories indicated that they weren't going to support construction jobs in Toronto, they weren't going to support the kind of economic spinoff that would come from something like this national trade centre in Toronto.

We have, over the last number of weeks, been in discussions with members of the federal Liberals who would be representing the GTA and other parts of Ontario with respect to these projects. We believe they think it is an important project that would probably be in keeping with their jobs approach.

As the Premier has indicated, we're hoping to work cooperatively with the new federal government. We hope this is a project that could go ahead. We will be going with Metro to the federal Liberals very soon to seek their support for this project.

Mr Perruzza: How many jobs exactly are involved in this project?

Hon Ms Lankin: If we're talking about the trade centre and the construction jobs -- the member started off by speaking about the number of unemployed construction workers in his riding, people he's been working with -- there would be over 2,000 person-years of construction jobs alone on this project.

The import of the project is much bigger than that. The convention centre and the trade centre combined have the opportunity to attract trade and commerce activities to the Metro area, certainly tourism spinoffs and service sector spinoffs, and act as an attraction to Toronto, which is a gateway to the rest of the province and for tourism. It's an important project. The kind of employment spinoffs and the kind of economic development that would come from that deserve support.

I want to point out, lastly, to the member that the province's commitment to this project is firm. Metro has said its commitment is contingent on federal government participation. We will be going with them --

The Speaker (Hon David Warner): Could the minister conclude her response, please.

Hon Ms Lankin: -- to the new Liberal government. Hopefully we'll be able to conclude negotiations very soon and get these projects under way.

Mr Robert Chiarelli (Ottawa West): Mr Speaker, I have a point of privilege arising out of the comments of the Minister of Municipal Affairs in response to the member for Ottawa East. The Minister of Municipal Affairs stated quite clearly that he had received letters from Liberal members of this Legislature supporting Bill 77. That is clearly untrue. I would ask the minister to withdraw that statement.

The Speaker: The member does not have a point of privilege and he knows that.

EMPLOYMENT EQUITY

Mr Alvin Curling (Scarborough North): For a moment I thought I'd lose this opportunity. My question is to the minister responsible for the employment equity legislation, the Minister of Citizenship. Madam Minister, your flawed employment equity bill, Bill 79, I remind you, has been withdrawn because it is incomplete, poorly drafted and lacks consultation and because of a number of other inadequacies which of course you can name to me.

What must I tell the business and advocacy groups which are waiting very patiently for when this bill will be implemented? Because there's a time frame you put forward there. Could you advise me accordingly? Because they're the ones who are going to implement this bill. We'd like to know what time frame you put forward that I should tell them.

Hon Elaine Ziemba (Minister of Citizenship and Minister Responsible for Human Rights, Disability Issues, Seniors' Issues and Race Relations): It's very nice of the member opposite to want to assist me in discussing this particular issue with the employers. We are consulting very extensively. They are very much aware of the time frames and where we are moving with this employment equity legislation.

I must say, we've spent two and a half years consulting; we have worked very hard with the employer groups, with the labour groups and with the designated groups. We want to make sure this bill is the best we can possibly have. If we are to do that, we must make sure that we continue to dialogue. That is what we're doing: We're making sure we talk to each and every group across this province.

Mr Gregory S. Sorbara (York Centre): Bob Rae had a bill when he was Leader of the Opposition.

The Speaker (Hon David Warner): Order, the member for York Centre.

Interjections.

Hon Ms Ziemba: It's very nice for the members opposite to keep trying to interrupt my line of thinking and my speech. These members opposite don't even vote on the principle of employment equity: equity and fairness in the workplace.

Mr Curling: Talking about voting and principles, I don't know where the NDP got principles: 26 of their clauses were withdrawn. They couldn't even put a bill together. We told them they didn't have it right, that they should go back to the drawing board.

I ask you, Madam Minister, when are you bringing back the bill which you withdrew because it was so poorly drafted, so poorly consulted? I ask you again, and we are supporting you, when are you bringing it back so the business community and the advocacy groups, which feel terribly treated by you, can implement it?

Hon Ms Ziemba: This bill is finely crafted. It is not flawed. If we are bringing back any amendments, it is to make sure that this bill works perfectly and that there are not any problems.

The reason this bill was stood down in committee was because the members opposite decided to leave the hearings and did not stay around even to debate. They walked out. They walked out of committee and wouldn't even continue on the clause-by-clause. We are bringing back this bill. It will be law and it will be a good piece of legislation with or without their help.

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The Speaker: On a point of privilege, the member for St George-St David.

Mr Tim Murphy (St George-St David): Mr Speaker, the minister in her answer said the reason she can't proceed is because we withdrew, and that's incorrect.

The Speaker: The member does not have a point of privilege, and he knows it.

PORNOGRAPHY

Mrs Margaret Marland (Mississauga South): My question is to the Minister of Consumer and Commercial Relations. Minister, I'm taking part in a panel tonight in Burlington to discuss the subject of pornography and all the inaction of your government. One of the guest panelists will be Dorothy Christian, the chair of the Ontario Film Review Board.

I would like to know from you today what kind of message I can give the viewing audience and the audience who are there in person tonight, who are concerned about your inaction with the Theatres Act amendments for which we've been asking you now for the past two years.

Also, do you have any concern at all about the fact that a group like the umbrella coalition addressing pornography, a grass-roots movement that's sweeping across this province, is only one of many that are trying to get a message through that they do not accept what the Ontario Film Review Board is doing in permitting material to be distributed around this province which is totally unacceptable for the community standards that the majority of people in this province today believe and want to cherish?

Hon Marilyn Churley (Minister of Consumer and Commercial Relations): I'd be happy to give the member some advice. I would recommend that one of the things she should say is to tell people that they might lobby the new federal government to look at the Criminal Code to make sure that violence, particularly graphic, gratuitous violence, is included as obscene in the Criminal Code.

To her second question, I would say to her again with all due respect that I don't think anybody in this House or anybody from any of the concerned groups out there on either side wants me or any member of this government to be making the final decision on what they can see and what they cannot see. They wouldn't want you to be making that decision if you were in government, or a Liberal to be making that decision.

It is a very complex area. That's why we have a film review board: to try to classify these films, to get as much information out there as they can. We are looking at display and access, because I think that is an area where we can make some changes with the municipalities to make sure --

Interjections.

The Speaker (Hon David Warner): Order. Has the minister finished? The time for oral questions has expired.

Mr Gregory S. Sorbara (York Centre): On a point of order, Mr Speaker: I wonder if I might get unanimous consent of the members of the House to dissolve Parliament and have the people of Ontario have an opportunity to directly evaluate the performance of the Rae government through a general election instead of indirectly evaluating, as they did last night.

The Speaker: The question is in order. Do we have unanimous consent?

Interjections.

The Speaker: I heard at least one negative voice.

INTRODUCTION OF BILLS

LAMBTON COUNTY BOARD OF EDUCATION AND TEACHERS DISPUTE SETTLEMENT ACT, 1993 / LOI DE 1993 SUR LE RÈGLEMENT DU CONFLIT ENTRE LE CONSEIL DE L'ÉDUCATION APPELÉ THE LAMBTON COUNTY BOARD OF EDUCATION ET SES ENSEIGNANTS

On motion by Mr Charlton, on behalf of Mr Cooke, the following bill was given first reading:

Bill 109, An Act to settle The Lambton County Board of Education and Teachers Dispute / Projet de loi 109, Loi visant à régler le conflit entre le conseil de l'éducation appelé The Lambton County Board of Education et ses enseignants.

EMPLOYER HEALTH TAX AMENDMENT ACT, 1993 / LOI DE 1993 MODIFIANT LA LOI SUR L'IMPÔT PRÉLEVÉ SUR LES EMPLOYEURS RELATIF AUX SERVICES DE SANTÉ

On motion by Mr Laughren, the following bill was given first reading:

Bill 110, An Act to amend the Employer Health Tax Act and the Workers' Compensation Act / Projet de loi 110, Loi modifiant la Loi sur l'impôt prélevé sur les employeurs relatif aux services de santé et la Loi sur les accidents du travail.

Hon Floyd Laughren (Minister of Finance): The government is introducing a new bill today to extend the employer health tax to self-employed individuals in Ontario. This bill will replace Bill 27, which I introduced in the Legislature on June 1 of this year.

Bill 27 required Ontario residents to pay the employer health tax on their world self-employment income. After consultation with self-employed stakeholders, the government has agreed to apply the tax only to the proportion of an individual's self-employment income allocated to Ontario for personal income tax purposes.

This bill will require self-employed people with a yearly income of more than $40,000, some of which must be earned in Ontario, to contribute to the cost of providing health care in our province. The bill will also provide these taxpayers with a 22% deduction on their health tax otherwise payable.

This bill also amends the Workers' Compensation Act. It will allow the Workers' Compensation Board to exchange information with the Ministry of Finance and other governments, ministries, boards and agencies, thereby improving government efficiency in reducing costs.

The Speaker (Hon David Warner): Pursuant to standing order 34(a), the member for Bruce has given notice of his dissatisfaction with the answer to his question given by the Premier concerning welfare fraud. This matter will be debated today at 6 pm.

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ORDERS OF THE DAY

Hon Brian A. Charlton (Government House Leader): We would like to call the Lambton County Board of Education and Teachers Dispute Settlement Act, 1993. Mr Speaker, Mr Cooke will be moving second reading, but before we do that, I believe I have agreement with the opposition House leaders and I seek unanimous consent to deal with both second and third readings of this bill this afternoon.

The Speaker (Hon David Warner): Are we agreed? Agreed. Just to clarify, it's the intention of the House to deal with first, second and third reading today. We're waiting for the Minister of Education and Training to lead off the debate.

LAMBTON COUNTY BOARD OF EDUCATION AND TEACHERS DISPUTE SETTLEMENT ACT, 1993 / LOI DE 1993 SUR LE RÈGLEMENT DU CONFLIT ENTRE LE CONSEIL DE L'ÉDUCATION APPELÉ THE LAMBTON COUNTY BOARD OF EDUCATION ET SES ENSEIGNANTS

Mr Cooke moved second reading of the following bill:

Bill 109, An Act to settle The Lambton County Board of Education and Teachers Dispute / Loi visant à régler le conflit entre le conseil de l'éducation appelé The Lambton County Board of Education et ses enseignants.

Hon David S. Cooke (Minister of Education and Training): I appreciate the cooperation of all members of the Legislature to be able to move forward with this legislation today. I'm going to be very brief because the essential comments I wanted to make were in the ministerial statement today, and I'll repeat a couple of those.

As I indicated in the statement earlier today, this dispute, which is for a collective agreement that took effect last September, September 1992, has been under discussion and negotiation now for 22 months. Every effort, in my view, has been made by the Education Relations Commission to try to find a settlement with the teachers and the board of this particular dispute. It became very clear last week, after the public meeting held in Lambton county on Thursday night and after the negotiations that preceded that public meeting, which went on for about 22 hours, I believe, that there would not be a final solution to all of the outstanding issues before the parties in Lambton county.

The Education Relations Commission at that point had to make a judgement, and in its judgement -- and the members will have seen this in the report that has been made public -- it came to the conclusion, a conclusion we agree with, that while jeopardy for the school year may not be the fact today, that as there was no settlement in sight for the strike and labour dispute, jeopardy was going to occur in the very near future.

Under the legislation that sets up negotiations between boards and teachers in this province which was dealt with and passed in the 1970s, it has been made very clear and supported by everybody in this province that ultimately, in a service like education, labour disputes must come to a conclusion, and if students are missing classes as a result of a dispute between a board and teachers, the government and the Minister of Education, ultimately through the Education Relations Commission, have the responsibility, number one, to the students in the school system.

There's obviously a very difficult balance that must be struck between the rights of teachers and boards to free collective bargaining and, on the other hand, the right of students to education.

It is our belief, and I think it is shared generally in this place, that by and large, Bill 100, the legislation that sets out the process for negotiations, has worked extremely well in this province. The fact is, more than 95% of the negotiations, I believe it is, are settled at the bargaining table without strikes. In the cases where there have been strikes or lockouts in this province, all but six of them have been settled at the negotiating table without having to bring in legislation, so this is the exception to the rule. And the fact of the matter is that we are all confronted with this difficulty when we're in government.

I think it would be unhelpful and would be inaccurate to state that Bill 100 is a complete failure, because this being the seventh case since 1975 or 1976, when Bill 100 came in, that governments have had to act, this is hardly an indication that the process and the legislation are a failure. By and large, the vast majority of cases are settled.

It's always politically expedient for some to say that because there's a strike and because that makes it politically difficult for whatever government's in power during the day, we should therefore review Bill 100 and eliminate the right to strike. That call has been made a couple of times in this Legislature, but I fundamentally disagree with that approach.

The fact is that relations between teachers and boards will be healthier, will be stronger and therefore improve and maintain quality education in our classrooms when teachers and boards negotiate in a mature way at the bargaining table and find solutions at the bargaining table. To go back to some old day where teachers did not have the right to strike, in my view, would be ultimately harmful to the students in the classroom, because that would have a very negative impact on relations between boards and teachers right across the province.

In this particular case, I think the solution that is being suggested in this legislation is innovative. What it does is send a clear message to the teachers and the board in Lambton and, I would argue, teachers and boards right across this province that if disputes are not settled at the local level, don't look to this government to find solutions for them.

The fact is that if we're going to have long-term solutions with collective bargaining in this province at the teachers' level, teachers and boards, the only way to have long-term solutions is for the parties to work it out at the local level. We as a government will accept our responsibility to act in the best interests of the students. That's our responsibility; that's my responsibility as Minister of Education to recommend to cabinet and my caucus and to the Legislature. But we will and we continue to expect boards and teachers to work out the solutions at the local level.

This legislation protects the students, gets classes resumed tomorrow and at the same time sends the dispute back to the Lambton board of education and the OSSTF for Lambton county and gives them several more opportunities to find those solutions at the local level. As I've said, there's only one issue in dispute, and it is my belief that if the parties put their minds to it over the next number of days, they will be able to find a solution and resolve this at the local level.

We have several stages in this. I've indicated in the House today what those stages are. We have an opportunity for negotiations. If that doesn't work, the final offer will be put to the teachers in a supervised vote. If the teachers accept the collective agreement, then we have a negotiated settlement. If they don't accept the settlement through the vote, then there's another opportunity to negotiate at the local level.

I believe this dispute can be solved at the local level. I also think, and I hope we have the support of other members of the Legislature, that, given the very difficult circumstances in a number of areas of the province, we need to send a clear message to boards and teachers today that they have got to find solutions.

There are other negotiations that are taking place in this province. I think this legislation sends a clear message to all those other negotiations: Find the solution at the local level. It's in the best interests of good labour relations in our education sector. It's also in the best interests obviously of the students.

There's one other area that I do want to touch on. The critic for the official opposition referred to it this afternoon. I would just ask him, if he's going to run through his comments on the Knott report again, to remember that in that report there is not a recommendation for a fundamental change in Bill 100. There is a recommendation for streamlining some of the processes.

There were discussions on the Knott report at the social contract table. There were commitments that were given by the government in terms of a response this year to the Knott report, and we intend to do that. But I wouldn't want anyone, based on his response to my statement in the House today, to believe that the Knott report is recommending something fundamental that would necessarily have avoided this situation in Lambton.

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There will still be cases in this province where it is difficult for the local parties to find a solution. The role and responsibility, I believe, of the government of the day and the Legislature is to do whatever is necessary to turn the dispute back to the local teachers and the boards to find a solution, but at the same time protect the students and make sure that their school year is not put at risk.

Those, by way of brief remarks, are the comments on behalf of the government. I appreciate the cooperation of all parties in being able to move this bill through the House quickly today.

The Deputy Speaker (Mr Gilles E. Morin): Questions or comments? The member for St Catharines.

Mr James J. Bradley (St Catharines): I appreciate the opportunity to speak for at least two minutes on this, to comment on the speech of the Minister of Education.

I have sat in this House for over 16 years and I never thought I would see the day when an NDP government would bring in strike-breaking legislation. I didn't always agree with every policy the NDP had but I always thought they stood for collective bargaining, and when someone withdrew his or her services, they felt that should be settled at the bargaining table.

Here we have an NDP government today bringing in legislation which will in fact break a strike of unionized people in this province. Certainly I suppose the longer one serves in a legislative body, the more one sees. I'll be interested to watch how many members of the government side stand up to vote for this strike-breaking legislation this afternoon.

I also want to say that it's interesting that the government has strongly advocated over the years the right to strike, and then when someone exercises that right to strike, the government decides that it's going to abrogate that particular right.

I would certainly like to know what Margaret Wilson thinks of this, for instance, and Gill Sandeman and Liz Barkley and Menno Vorster and Larry French and Malcolm Buchanan and Rod Albert and Jim Head, people who over the years have spent their time fighting on behalf of the New Democratic Party in the belief that the New Democratic Party stood for the free collective bargaining process.

I now know, when I read my local magazine from the St Catharines and District Labour Council, why the cover shows NDP collective bargaining up in flames. I wondered why that was, and then I realized it was the social contract. Now I see that the government, which has always been the advocate of working people and unionized people in this province, is today bringing in legislation which will in fact break the strike in Lambton, and I just find that interesting.

Mr Chris Stockwell (Etobicoke West): In commenting on the statement by the minister, I have noticed since September 1990 the crow population seriously depleted in Metropolitan Toronto. I've been trying to figure out why I don't see as many crows today as I saw in the 1980s. It's been perplexing to me until I came in today and I thought: "I know where all the crows are going. They had to eat them all." I was just curious to see if any of the animal rights groups would show any concern that maybe the NDP is doing away with the crow population in Ontario and forcing them to extinction.

Having said that, I'm with the member for St Catharines. I've not sat in this House as long. I sat in the lower level of government for a number of years and I listened to a lot of members of the New Democratic Party at municipal council when we had strikes. We had strikes at municipal council, we had garbage strikes, and I recall vividly the member for Etobicoke-Lakeshore was a member of Etobicoke council when we had the garbage strike. You could never order them back regardless. It was so important to allow them the right to strike, and I was just very surprised.

I'm sure Steven Langdon and Howard McCurdy and all the other members who've probably not chowed down on a good crow sandwich lately would be equally as interested in hearing the response from the Minister of Education as he gets his fellow mates to stand all abreast for three, maybe four times and order teachers back to work. You never thought you'd see the day. One good thing about having this government in for the last three years, it has certainly allowed us on this side of the House to have a little warm chuckle now and again at exactly where they stood on some of these issues.

Mr Murray J. Elston (Bruce): I obviously haven't read the bill as well as the minister has, although I do know that the bill will stop the striking activity; it basically will require the two parties to go back and work on these items again. It's a bit of a surprise to me, though, that the honourable member for Windsor-Riverside wouldn't have let us in on some of the discussions that have taken place between himself and the parties to this strike.

I know that in the course of deliberations around a situation like this there would have been some suggestions made by people who work directly for the Minister of Education about some of the avenues by which perhaps a solution could be reached. I think it is really for us to know in this Legislative Assembly, before we go through the entire afternoon's deliberations, what suggestions the Minister of Education has made to the board of education in Lambton county, what suggestions he has made to the OSSTF Lambton local. He should bring those here to this forum so that we can at least understand that there is a realistic prospect of the two parties being sent by this legislation back to the table so that they can come up with a solution.

It is not a very satisfactory result if we merely pass this legislation, opening the schools, putting the teachers back in the classrooms, putting the board members back around the table, if there are not some reasonable suggestions being followed up on from the minister's staff and from the ministry personnel. I think it would help us all if it could be shared in this room with all of us what avenues the ministry and the minister think would lead these two groups to come to an amicable and sound solution for the education system in Lambton.

The Deputy Speaker: Any further questions or comments? If not, Minister, you have two minutes to reply.

Hon Mr Cooke: Just a couple of points. One, I really believe, when you're taking a look specifically at this type of situation, nobody ever expected that you would have strikes in the education field and that the government would never act, that the best interests of the students would never be protected.

No one ever argued that rights to strike or lock out would be completely uncontrolled, no mitigating factors in terms of government having to look out for the best interests of the students, and nobody has ever advocated that. In fact it's built right into the legislation, and we supported that right back when the bill came in in 1976. So that is a reality.

I understand the member from Etobicoke and his confusion over the difference between a strike in the municipal sector and garbage collectors versus education, but I would argue that's a reasonably offensive comparison. It's certainly pretty clear that a strike of teachers, a labour dispute that has involved thousands of students and their need to get back into the classroom -- I really don't believe there's any comparison, but I think that might be his municipal background and his lack of knowledge in this area.

Finally, I should indicate to the member for Bruce that the role I have played is to keep in touch regularly with the Education Relations Commission. The legislation that was introduced today is entirely based, and appropriately so, on the ERC's report. I believe we have every reason to be confident in the role that the ERC has played in this case and the recommendations it has made.

The Deputy Speaker: Further debate?

Mr Charles Beer (York North): I rise to participate in this debate. I want to say at the outset to the minister that we will be supporting this piece of legislation. I have some comments that I want to make on it and also some comments with respect to the state of collective bargaining in the educational sector. But I think everyone would agree that the most important thing to do right now is to ensure that the students in Lambton county and Sarnia are able to get back to education and to find some other way in which the teachers and the board can resolve the outstanding differences that have meant we've had some 30 days where the young people in that board have not been able to receive any education.

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Now, I want to say to the minister that since Bill 100 came in in 1975, I think we all recognize that when we look at the statistical data around the number of strikes, it has served, on balance, well, whether under the Conservative government of the day that brought in the legislation, under the Liberals after 1975, or since 1990. But there are a series of, I think, none the less troubling elements of that.

I want to say to the minister, and I'm going to come back to this in terms of the Knott report, that when we talk about the need to review Bill 100, it is not to withdraw that fundamental right, the right to strike, which school trustees, school boards and teachers have all agreed is important and part of the democratic process, but that we really do need to be looking at how to bring a piece of legislation that was brought in in 1975, I think, up to date.

But before we do that, I would like to just raise some questions with respect to the legislation. I think it is relatively brief and clear. As I understand it, what the minister is seeking to do is first and foremost to ensure that the teachers are back in the classroom tomorrow, and then there are a series of steps or stages in which the parties to the dispute are going to be able to sit down and hopefully bring about some resolution to this strike.

Now, the member for Bruce raised the question around just what exactly would be the nature of the settlement. If memory serves, in some of the situations that we dealt with as a government, I think the last one, in a similar piece of legislation, the Minister of Education of the day, the member from Renfrew, did spell out what would happen if in fact the parties were not able to resolve the issue. I think it would have been our preference to see that in this legislation.

I appreciate the remarks of the minister that what he is trying to do is both to ensure that the trustees and the teachers develop a better framework around conflict resolution and also that within this particular board area of Lambton, where relations between the board and the teachers -- those relations have not been good historically, at least over the course of time that Bill 100 has been in place. None the less, I think it just isn't clear to parents in that area, to teachers, to trustees, what specifically the minister would be contemplating in terms of specifics. That might well be something that, were it in the legislation, would assist the parties in really trying to come to an agreement, if they had a much better sense of what it was that the minister was going to do.

The way the clause reads at the moment, it simply says, if I can get the right section, that the minister may direct resolution of a dispute under subsection 6(1): "If a majority of the teachers who vote under section 5 do not accept the offer and, by December 6, 1993, the parties have not entered into a collective agreement or agreed in writing on a method for resolving the dispute, the Minister of Education and Training may, by order, direct that the dispute be resolved in accordance with a method specified by the minister." But at no place in the bill is that method spelled out, and I think there are some legitimate concerns that could be expressed by all parties to the collective bargaining process, and indeed by parents, by ratepayers and by the students in the system with respect to exactly how that should be done.

As the minister has said, what he hopes is that between now and December 6 there will be a resolution that the two parties will make. But in effect what we have here, even if it is only the seventh time we've had to have legislation, is that we have to recognize that this is not a happy day, that there has been a breakdown, that we have failed, that the adults have failed the young people in the school system because we haven't been able to come up with an agreement, for whatever reason.

I think we have to then ask ourselves the question: Once this goes through and we have resolved that particular situation, what do we do in terms of others and what kinds of things ought we to be looking at to make the system work better?

Over the course of the last month, I would say, we have had, and I suspect the government has and our colleagues in the Progressive Conservative Party, a number of representatives from different teachers' organizations in different parts of the province who have been in expressing real concern about the implementation of the social contract, the expenditure controls which the government has imposed, and how all of that is having an impact on free collective bargaining. I know that a number of the teachers' organizations have said they want to sit down with the minister to review how a number of existing or potential disputes are going to be resolved within the way in which the social contract in particular is being put in place.

I think one of the things that the minister, in recognizing the need for some kind of analysis review and some potential changes to Bill 100, which is the bill that deals with collective bargaining in the educational sector -- when you look at reports such as the report that the Ontario Public School Boards' Association produced earlier this year and you look at responses that were put in by the different teaching federations, again earlier this year, to the Knott committee, there are a number of things around the way in which collective bargaining functions where there is some agreement among the various players that I think would both speed up the process and improve it.

I would want to say to the minister that I think one needs to make a distinction between suggesting that perhaps this is a good time for us collectively to review the operation of Bill 100 -- that just because we do that does not mean that what we are proposing is that there should not exist a right to strike for teachers.

I think one of the things that struck the Conservative government of the day when it brought in the legislation, and if you talk in particular to trustees who were in school boards in the late 1960s and early 1970s, before Bill 100 came in, was that even if you didn't have a right to strike, there were many ways in which, if there were bad labour relations between trustees, between school boards and the teachers, there were many things that could go on within a school system that would really cause tremendous problems in terms of the smooth functioning of that system and the education that young people were getting. So what Bill 100 was predicated on was saying that there are these mutual rights on the part of boards and on the part of teachers, with a framework that was geared to trying to get at the facts and to bring about a solution. That was the focus, and I think if you go back and look at the debates in the House in the mid-1970s, you'll see that's there. What I think was always troubling to everyone then, and has been troubling through the course of -- what are we now? -- some 17 years, 18 years almost, that we've been functioning under this particular bill, is how we balance on the one hand that free collective bargaining process where the trustees represent the management side and the federations the teachers when there is a third party, which is the students. Where do we find the balance between those rights?

The answer was, in 1975 -- and I think still a creative one -- that we have an Education Relations Commission which will have within it people with experience in terms of labour relations in the educational sector and also a capacity and an ability to determine when a student's education is in jeopardy. I think that particular issue, especially over the last five, six, seven, eight years -- I can recall when we were the government -- with the development of the semestered schools, has really raised a lot of questions. I know the minister has commented that the ERC looks at that factor, and I accept that they're aware of that, but I don't think we have clear rules and approaches around the semestered system, because when you're looking at 30 days, as we are in the case of this strike, in a semestered school, we're not just talking about having missed 30; we're really talking about them having missed almost 60.

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There are other strikes and other situations, but I think we just need to recognize that situations do change, and therefore the need for a review. I guess this is one of the places too where, having had a bit of experience in government but now a longer experience in opposition, it seems to me this is a perfect area for asking one of the committees of the Legislature to look at, in this case, the Knott report, to look at the teachers' recommendations, to look at the trustees' recommendations and to look at other documents such as those of my colleague from Ottawa, who brought forward a private member's bill with respect to the rights of students. I think we just need to sit down and say, "Look, how can we make this function better?"

I don't think there's any problem and indeed I don't think we should run away from people who may want to propose radical change to the system. I know I am comfortable, and I think our party is, with the framework that is set out and exists in Bill 100, but just to use one example, both teachers and trustees have said that the fact-finding function is one that can cause a lot of difficulty because it can really slow down our ability to bring about a solution.

For people who may be interested in what is in this, the Knott report was a document that was put together. It began in August 1992. It was an internal document. It was to be a study of labour relations in the elementary and secondary education sector of Ontario. Last February there was an interim report, and then that report was responded to by the major stakeholders, as we call them, in education: the Ontario Teachers' Federation, the secondary school teachers' federation, the separate school trustees' association, the public school boards' association, the English Catholic teachers' association and so on.

When you read that report, as the minister says, it does not call for a fundamental change, but it does say, "Look, there are a number of key issues here where there is some consensus or agreement, if not in specifics at least in direction, and we should be looking very carefully at that to see if we can then bring this up to date."

Again, remember that this piece of legislation is some 18 years old. There was a report done in June 1980 called The Report of a Commission to Review the Collective Negotiation Process Between Teachers and School Boards, some 100 foolscap pages. It was done after a fairly extensive consultation period. Out of that there were a few changes made, but nothing in any sort of major way of really looking at how well that piece of legislation is functioning. So I say to the minister and to the government that I think over the course of the next couple of years might well be a good period of time to look at this, for a number of reasons.

One, the social contract impact is real, and inevitably, I'm sure, the minister is going to be sitting down with representatives from the Ontario Teachers' Federation where they have some very specific concerns around the impact of the social contract and the functioning of the collective bargaining process as it exists. We also know that we need to have some kind of exit strategy from the social contract for April 1, 1996. What kinds of agreements can we have among boards, teachers and the government of the day so that we don't just simply get back into the kind of situation we had earlier in terms of the expenditures we're making in the educational sector?

I think this is a point where we could very usefully sit down, representatives from all the different groups that are involved, and try to determine what is going to be the best and the most effective way to go.

Again going back to the Knott report, at the conclusion of that review and in the report it was noted by Mr Knott, who was a senior adviser, broader public sector, labour relations secretariat, that obviously, as of March 29, 1993, when that was presented, with the expenditure controls and with the social contract we were in some very difficult times in terms of just how the collective bargaining process was going to function in the educational sector. That being said, there were a number of recommendations made, some 10 in all. I would like to refer to them and put them on the record.

The summary of recommendations: The first one was, "That the School Boards and Teachers Collective Negotiations Act be amended to provide the following: (a) expedited arbitration and mediation-arbitration of grievances; (b) increase powers of rights arbitrators; (c) deem just cause to govern dismissal and discipline; (d) impose duty of fair representation; (e) discontinue boards of reference...; (f) prohibit unfair labour practices; (g) serve notice to negotiate in March not January; (h) make fact-finding optional; (i) permit school boards to lock out in same way teachers strike; (j) increase powers of Education Relations Commission."

Obviously, some of that is the jargon of the trade. When you go into the report, these recommendations are not fundamentally changing the act, but they are making some proposals where I think it would be very useful to have a much broader public discussion.

The report also says, in its second recommendation, "That the negotiation of collective agreements continue to be the responsibility of the school board and its teachers." Now, one of the arguments has been, and it's discussed openly, whether the province should be negotiating on a province-wide basis or whether we should continue to have individual school boards negotiating with their teachers. It's been our view that there is a benefit in having those negotiations take place at the school board level, in terms of local accountability, but there are arguments, around the basic financial settlement made, that the province should be doing that. That's something we should look at, and not be afraid to look at, publicly.

There is a series of other recommendations. Number 5 is, "That the definition of 'strike' be retained." But there is also a proposal that the whole definition of "work to rule" needs greater agreement among teachers and school boards, and that is proposed, then it goes on to talk about the role of the Education Relations Commission and how it can function more effectively.

There are 10 recommendations and, as I mentioned, all of the major educational organizations had provided commentary to Mr Knott, setting out what they thought could be done to make that whole process function better.

I want to say to the minister that we would join with him and with other colleagues in the Legislature in looking at a way one of our standing committees could look at specific proposals that the government would make for change to Bill 100, change that I think would find a consensus of support within the broad educational sector. If we don't look at it and if we continue to put it off, the real concern I would have is that if we have too many Lambtons or if East Parry Sound becomes even more exacerbated than it currently is, if there are strikes in other parts of the province, the public mood today is such that it could direct us in ways that aren't going to be useful or helpful in dealing with disputes in the education sector. We have a responsibility not to run away from those issues but to say that they're real.

If you have talked, as I have -- I know other members have; certainly the member for Sarnia has, because he and I have chatted about this as well -- to parents, after probably about a week if not before, what is so frustrating for parents is trying to determine: "How is this impacting upon my son or daughter? Are there not other ways or a better process within Bill 100 that will expedite the discussion of the issues and getting them resolved?"

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One of the things the minister referred to in his statement and also in his comments was just how long this particular dispute has been going on. It's well over a year. If we go and look at the private sector and the relationships with unions, by and large, going to some of the big areas, whether it's in terms of automobiles or petrochemicals or other areas like that, they have worked very hard at trying to develop a process that's going to be much more responsive, gets the major issues on to the table and has them resolved. In some cases it does lead to a strike but, again, if you look over the last few years I think there's been a recognition that we have to find a way to not get into strikes but to resolve them.

Those are things we should be looking at as well in the public sector. If we're talking about the educational or the health sector, those areas where we have large numbers of employees but where there is a public that's involved as a kind of third party, whether students or the public generally, we need to be very much aware of the balancing of rights. I think we can have a free collective bargaining process but with a much more effective system we could put in place than the one we have.

I don't think that has to be done, nor should it be done, nor would I agree that it be done, in the context of, should teachers have the right to strike or not? I think they should. That's part of a democratic process and system. When you have that right it is then incumbent upon the teachers, as it is on trustees, to say, "Can we make this system work better?" I think we can. There are some proposals out there, and I would urge the minister to look at them and to really initiate a discussion that could lead to those improvements through legislative change. I think you would find a positive response from members on all sides of the House.

In closing my comments on this particular piece of legislation, I simply want to reiterate that my party will be supporting the bill. We hope, with the minister, that in the discussions that will follow the passage of the bill the trustees and the teachers will be able to resolve their differences so that we in this Legislature will not have to impose a settlement. Clearly, we are at a point where, in the interests of the young people in that school system, something has to be done and we have to move to ensure that their education is not jeopardized.

Let's not lose this opportunity to recognize some of the broader issues that have come forward. Let's focus on how we can resolve them and how we can make the system work better. To say this is only the seventh time we've had to come forward with legislation is fine in one sense, but I think even having to do it seven times says that we can still do better and that there are ways this can function more effectively.

Mr Elston: Interestingly enough, a couple of the comments by the member have raised around education what is really in the back of the minds of a whole group of people: the whole issue of jeopardy. The question that resides in everybody's mind is, "When does somebody determine that my child is going to be negatively affected by this whole series of events, as regrettable as they may very well be?" The thought that someone who is supposed to be starting school in September can wait until November 1 to get into school and not be disadvantaged in their school development somehow doesn't logically settle with parents.

As a parent of school-age children, it somehow doesn't feel right to me, and I've been fortunate to have been able to avoid any of these circumstances around my own children. But how is it that we have a school year that goes from September till December with a break and then from January through till the first part of June and we can say to one group of people in a semester system, "You don't have to start until November 1 and no problems will occur"? It just doesn't fit right.

In fact, there are going to be problems for some of those children who are in that system. Actually, some of them may be irreversible; some of those people may not go back to school. It bothers me somehow that this whole problem of determining when someone is going to be disadvantaged has to wait for some imagined average student while we dismiss the fates of some people who will never go back because they may, fortunately enough, have gotten a part-time job or may have ended up not being able to wait to go back.

Hon Mr Cooke: What are you suggesting?

Mr Elston: I don't know what I'm suggesting; all I am suggesting to you is that we can't explain this to parents, we can't explain it to the taxpayers and somehow we're going to have to do that.

The Deputy Speaker: Any further questions or comments?

Mr Bob Huget (Sarnia): I'd like to thank the member for York North for his comments. I'm sure he's aware, as are others in this House, how distressing this has been to my riding and certainly how frustrated and angry both parents and students are about this latest development in terms of this latest strike. This isn't the first one in Lambton county; it's about the third in a little over a decade. It has gotten significantly more frustrating and disillusioning for parents and students in our area.

I take interest in his comments about the possibilities of boards and teachers working together in a more constructive fashion and I think it may, in part, address the member for Bruce's point not so much about when jeopardy is determined but about how we start a process and create a culture and environment where boards and teachers can work through their problem areas and resolve their own disputes so that we don't get into the position in the first place of having to determine whether or not students are in jeopardy. The message from parents and students in my area is that they would very much like to see this board and its teachers find a way to work through their own issues, find a way to resolve their own differences and find a way to ensure we don't get back into this situation again.

I think the important point of this legislation, as it's proposed, is that it calls for the board and the teachers to develop a plan by May 1994 to improve their relationship. I think it may create an environment where they can honestly sit down and look at ways they can start to deal with each other on a far more constructive basis.

I know many of the people in industry, unionized or otherwise, have had to go through that process, and I think it's a process we're going to have to go through in the public sector as well.

Mr Beer: Thank you to the two members who have spoken, really about the similar elements of the dilemma we have.

First to my colleague the member for Bruce, I think that question of jeopardy is one in the current system where we have difficulty, and nobody has a nice, neat, simple answer, but sometimes I think that when we don't have that nice, neat, simple answer, it's no longer good enough to just say, "Well, we'll continue to leave that to the Education Relations Commission." I think there are times when we need to say, in a more public way, "Okay, given the kind of educational system that we have today, the demands that are there, the changes that have occurred, are the approaches we've taken in the past still going to work effectively?" No matter how you slice it, as someone who is a former teacher I would say that if a pupil has lost 30 days of schooling in a semestered system, or indeed 30 days in a regular school system, I'm just not comfortable that the education of that young person not only is in jeopardy after those 30 days but has been in jeopardy for even a lesser time.

I accept that when we were government, and the Conservatives, we wrestled with that and different things happened. I don't say that as something to say, "Look, you and only you are at fault because here we are at the 30th day," but we haven't really sat down and talked about how we can better define what we mean by jeopardy, and I think we have to do it.

Finally, in response to the comment from our colleague in Sarnia, looking at how other areas, particularly the private sector, have tried to develop better mechanisms to work through major issues and disputes without getting into a strike situation is something we need to do. There's a lot the public sector can learn, in terms of bargaining, from the private sector.

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The Deputy Speaker: Any further debate?

Mrs Elizabeth Witmer (Waterloo North): Our party will be supporting the legislation, An Act to settle The Lambton County Board of Education and Teachers Dispute, which the government has introduced today. Our only disappointment is that the minister did not act more quickly to get the students back to school. Personally, I'm very concerned and I know the parents and the community have been extremely concerned, because our Conservative critic from London North has received many phone calls.

Certainly the question of jeopardy does have to be resolved; 30 days is a very, very long time, particularly when you get into a semestered school where the students are involved in some very concentrated study and are only there for half a year.

Our Conservative critic from London North has been continually urging the minister to show some decisive leadership ever since October 5. On that day and on subsequent days, such as October 12, October 14, October 20 and October 21, she has been encouraging the minister to consider the rights of the almost 7,000 students in Lambton county to an education. It's unfortunate that it has taken 30 days for this minister to bring forward this legislation today.

We also have some real concerns about this legislation. If you take a look at the social contract and at the fiscal restraints that have been imposed by this government upon school boards and upon the rest of the public sector, you really have to wonder why the students in Lambton county were forced to even be out of school for 30 days.

As I indicated, these are 30 days that are of critical importance, especially in a semestered school, and now those 30 days must be made up. I sincerely hope the teachers and the board will work cooperatively to develop a joint plan outlining how these lost days can be made up for the students. I can tell you, personally I know it will be a very difficult task. It's hoped, however, that this will be a step to developing a more positive relationship in Lambton county between teachers and the board because, unfortunately, this is not the first time they've found themselves in a strike situation.

I'm also concerned because, going back to the social contract legislation, that document was to deal with all the public servants in a fair and equitable manner, as I indicated before, yet it now appears -- the minister has not indicated that it might not happen -- that the teachers in Lambton county may indeed get increases through an arbitrated settlement.

I'd like to draw your attention to two key clauses from the social contract legislation. They are subsection 24(5), which says, "If a collective agreement has expired before June 14, 1993," as this one has, "and on that date the employees that were formerly bound by it are without a collective agreement, the compensation of these employees is fixed at the amount they were receiving under the last collective agreement in force before June 14, 1993." What impact does that clause have on this particular situation? My colleague from London North has asked that question and it certainly has been not satisfactorily answered.

The other subsection I want to bring to your attention is subsection 40(1): "No increase in compensation shall be given as a result of any arbitration award or decision made on or after June 14, 1993." Again, will the Lambton teachers get an increase? Will it be in opposition to dealing with all public servants in a fair and equitable manner? At this point in time, those are questions the minister has not yet answered.

Hon Mr Cooke: Why didn't you ask them in question period?

Mrs Witmer: Those questions have been asked by my colleague from London North and they have not been satisfactorily answered.

I'm also very concerned about the statement that says, "Minister may direct resolution of dispute," and it indicates, "If a majority of the teachers who vote under section 5 do not accept the offer and, by December 6, 1993, the parties have not entered into a collective agreement or agreed in writing on a method for resolving the dispute, the Minister of Education and Training may, by order, direct that the dispute be resolved in accordance with a method specified by the minister."

What is the minister going to do in December? This creates uncertainty. What is it that he can't do now? He knows the parties have both been in this strike position now for a long time; for 22 months they've been negotiating. If they can't resolve it in 22 months, how does he expect them to resolve the dispute by December 6? What is it that he's going to do? That's a question that needs to be answered as well, and I think it's unfortunate that the minister hasn't indicated what method he will be using. That's an issue that I think needs to be resolved, and I would like to have the minister tell us exactly what it is he plans to do on December 6 that he's not indicated already.

I'd also like to draw your attention to the plan to improve the relationship. It says, "On or before May 2, 1994, the parties shall jointly submit to the Minister of Education and Training and to the Education Relations Commission a plan outlining the steps the parties will take to improve their relationship."

I'm not sure you can legislate good relations. I appreciate the fact that the two parties will be forced to sit down and put a plan together. I only hope it will be successful, because as we've indicated before, the lives and the education of 7,000 students have been put into jeopardy. I hope that particular board and its teachers will focus on what's happened, will focus on the impact this has had on the students and the parents in that particular community, and I hope they will do everything possible to ensure that the relationship between the board and the teachers does improve.

It is certainly our hope that this issue can be resolved at the local level. That's extremely important. If we're going to see a good relationship in the future, it's absolutely essential that the individuals who are going to be impacted by the legislation do everything possible and strive for a compromise that takes into consideration the rights of the students. I wish them luck in that endeavour.

The Deputy Speaker: Questions or comments?

Hon Mr Cooke: I'd just like to ask one question and make one comment. I understand the argument the member makes about 30 days, as the critic for the Liberal Party stated as well. It's very good politics to make that kind of statement, that 30 days is too long, but what is the member suggesting? Is 25 days okay? Is 20 days too long? Is the Labour critic for the Conservative Party suggesting that there should be no right to strike? The Liberal Party is clearly on record as saying the right to strike is fundamental. What's the Conservative Party suggesting? Taking away the right they granted them just 16 or 17 years ago?

You can't say that a group of people have the right to strike and then somehow in legislation or regulation say that 20 days is too long and that after that point, then automatically the strike is over. You might as well have no right to strike at all if those are the kinds of rules you're going to be putting into place. That will destroy any ability to get to a mature relationship between management and labour.

It's easy, it's good politics, but maybe the critic should simply say: "I'm just playing politics with this. I'm not really suggesting that these are solutions we'd like to make."

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I'd like to point out one other fundamental fault in what the critic is saying, and the critic for the official opposition as well. The semestered system is something that concerned me very much when we first looked at the Lambton situation, but I did look back on the history of disputes in this province. Four out of six of the disputes that have been resolved by legislation were semestered, the longest one being Sudbury, which was 56 days, so there are some issues to remember.

Mr Beer: I want to comment on my colleague from Waterloo's statement but also in the context of what the minister has said, because in raising the issue around 30 days or looking at the 56 or other time frames we've had, the problem for any government, of whatever political stripe, is, how do you define and what sort of criteria are you using in order to say, "This is too long?"

Obviously, if the legislation said 19 days or 23 days, that's not necessarily going to be helpful, because there may be instances where it is much less. To the public the concern simply is, what sort of message are we sending? Are we saying it really doesn't matter if you're not in school for 30 days or 56 days or 20 days? We need a more open, public debate around just what really is acceptable. With so many more students in our classrooms today with different kinds of learning disabilities -- and we have all made a conscious attempt to try to get more and more young people into the regular school system -- what is the impact on those young people and how are we going to handle their education?

Those are things we really do need to discuss, and to say that my colleague from Waterloo raises the issue of 30 days as some kind of easy political statement is ludicrous. This has to be a concern to all of us in terms of how we make those definitions, and I think we have a legitimate role in trying to shape the way in which the Education Relations Commission is going to come to those issues and try to determine what the best thing is to do. I think it is an important point that our colleague from Waterloo has raised.

The Deputy Speaker: Any further questions or comments? The member for Waterloo North, you have two minutes to reply.

Mrs Witmer: First of all, I would like to respond to the minister regarding the right to strike. It was our party that introduced in 1975 the right to strike, and that right has existed legally in Ontario. We certainly do support that right to strike, and I'd like to go on the record as affirming that right.

I've been involved in negotiations myself and recognize the importance of bringing partners together, but I also recognize the importance of arriving at a settlement, through consultation and compromise, that responds to the needs of the local community, and I trust that those in Lambton county will be able to arrive themselves at that type of resolution of this particular conflict.

Regarding the number 30, I think my colleague in the opposition has made a very good point. I don't think any one of us can determine what is appropriate, whether it's five days, whether it's 10 days or whether it's 15 days. When I take a look at the length of strikes, I see in 1991-92, Elgin 33, Ottawa 23, Carleton 28; in 1990-91, I see Lambton 28, Lambton 10, Peterborough 9, Stormont, Dundas and Glengarry 28.

I think there needs to be a discussion and there needs to be a debate. I think we also need to take into consideration the fact that we're dealing here with a semestered school. For anyone who is familiar with a semestered school and the operation of that school, the students do only take those particular subjects from September to January, so it's much more difficult to make up the time that is lost.

I think it's time for teachers and the wider community to be involved with the politicians and come to some determination as to how we can effectively ensure that the needs of the students in our schools are met and met more effectively and that we do not allow strikes to go to the point of 30 days.

Mrs Ellen MacKinnon (Lambton): I believe that all members of this House support this bill. It's very important to the students of Lambton county that the current interruption to their school year come to an end. For 30 days students and their parents have watched from the sideline as the strike involving secondary school teachers and the Lambton County Board of Education has dragged on.

If there was some prospect that a settlement was around the corner, then perhaps this legislation would not be so urgent. But a settlement is not just around the corner. The teachers and the board both say they cannot reach an agreement. The Education Relations Commission has done its best to bring a solution to this situation. The teachers and board are at a stalemate, with no prospect of any solution. Meanwhile, the classrooms of Lambton county remain closed and empty.

Secondary students are at a critical point in their education, particularly the OAC students. They should be in class getting an education, not sitting at home waiting for a resolution that may never come.

The legislation introduced today by the Minister of Education and Training, the Honourable Dave Cooke, will allow those students to be back in the classrooms. It will allow teachers to get back to work. At the same time it will allow parties to try once again to find a local solution to their dispute. To me, this is one of the most important aspects of the legislation that Mr Cooke has brought in today. If they do not succeed within the time specified by the bill, then the government will meet its responsibility to bring an end to this prolonged and difficult set of negotiations.

This legislation will benefit all those affected: students, parents, teachers and education administrators. I look forward to the approval of this bill and immediate return of the students of Lambton county back to their schools tomorrow.

Mr Dalton McGuinty (Ottawa South): You may recall, Mr Speaker, that I introduced a private member's bill approximately a year ago, at which time I proposed recognizing formally that students have a right to attend class.

One of the things that becomes apparent at Queen's Park, Mr Speaker, I'm sure you'll agree, is that we are effectively besieged and lobbied by various interest groups. But one of the groups we don't hear from but to whom I would suggest we owe a great obligation are the students in this province. I would suggest that no students are going to be writing us regarding this issue once the matter has been settled.

Notwithstanding that, I think it's important for us to recognize the importance of education. Surely we spout that on a regular basis. But now's the time, I think, as my colleague the critic for the Liberal Party has suggested, for us to use the occasion to stimulate a larger debate where we can properly consider the impact Bill 100 has had since its creation and make a proper determination and assessment as to whether it's really working.

I had an opportunity, in doing some research for my private member's bill, to pull together some of these statistics, in which effort I was greatly assisted by the Education Relations Commission, which has a wealth of knowledge in this matter. The total number of strikes at that point in time -- I collected these at the end of 1991 -- was 56. I gather we're up to about 60 now. At that time, the total number of students who were affected was some 789,000. The total number of days lost was just under 1,400.

The average length of a strike in this province at that time, as I say, calculated late in 1991, was about 24 days. This strike has lasted some 30 days. The longest strike, as the minister made mention earlier today, was 56 days. Incredibly -- I find this incredible -- to my knowledge, no school year has ever been extended in order to allow students to make up for the lost time.

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The Education Relations Commission has declared the students' year to be in jeopardy some nine times, I believe. On average, the commission has made this determination at 40 days, which works out to about two calendar months. So in fact, when people argue that Bill 100 is working effectively, I would argue that in so far as students are concerned, it is not working effectively.

Statistics show that approximately 50,000 students every year in this province are kept from their classes for over one month. Some may argue that, within the context of collective negotiations, those are acceptable losses and I would say that, in 1993, in this province, when each and every one of us recognizes how important education is to our future and to our economic recovery, those are no longer acceptable losses.

I would also point out that the Education Relations Commission can hardly be said to be at fault here in terms of when and how it makes the call. It's simply operating under the rules of the day. Under those rules, we have built within the system now this unfortunate capacity to miss some 30 days of school without having any obligation to make up that lost time. That perhaps is a sorry commentary about what is going on in our classrooms.

People from time to time talk about some of the costs associated with a strike, and I want to speak from a students' perspective so that we gain some kind of an understanding of what it means to them. Apart from the days lost in school, I think it's important to understand that -- I've been informed by a number of principals that some students simply do not return to school after a strike. These are, generally speaking, students who are having some difficulties at school and the prolonged absence from school, the enforced absence from school, provides them with the axe to sever really effectively any link they have with the school and they simply don't come back.

Some students, on the other hand, get into trouble. It's been said that an idle mind is the devil's workshop and some of our students take advantage of the opportunity and get out and about and do things that perhaps you wouldn't have them do. I think it's important to recognize as well that, since Bill 100 became law some 18 years ago, there are more and more single-parent families and there are more and more households where both spouses are working, which means that when students are kept from their classes the parents are not at home to care for them, to lend them guidance and to watch over them. In most cases parents obviously make special arrangements to see that their children are cared for, but often that entails additional cost and hardship.

The other costs associated with a strike in so far as students are concerned is the ill will that is generated. I'm not talking about the ill will that's generated in the community itself, or the ill will generated between trustees and teachers, but rather the ill will that cannot help but permeate the classroom, at least to some extent. That's going to have some impact on the quality of education our children are going to receive.

I think the other perspective that students would have on this is that it has been said that children learn what they live. We had an interesting incident in Ottawa at the tail end of our latest round of strikes when a class of grade 8s walked out of the classroom because there was a difficulty, as they saw it, with the busing, busing times.

They decided that the way they would express their concern was to walk out of the classroom. It was rather telling to see these kids in baseball caps, chewing bubble gum, deciding that, in order to give expression to their rights, they would walk out of a classroom. So I'm not sure that we're giving the best possible example in terms of having a prolonged, agonizing strike. Those are some of the real costs in so far as our children are concerned.

From a student perspective, here are some of what I perceive to be the shortcomings in Bill 100. First of all, there's no limit on the length of time that parties can negotiate. We have had, in many, many cases, negotiations and strikes to settle contracts that had expired several months earlier. Also, it's well known that more bargaining does not necessarily make for better bargaining.

The other problem with Bill 100 is that when negotiations break down, the ERC appoints a fact-finder who may or may not recommend terms of settlement. It seems to me that, from a student perspective, the ERC brings a wealth of experience, as I indicated earlier, to these kinds of issues, and we may be missing an opportunity there in terms of having a recommendation made.

Then at that point, after a recommendation is made, there is still no obligation on the teachers or the board to formally consider that recommendation by way of a vote. Again, from a student perspective, remember the students' interest in this never deviates: it's to be in the classroom. That is often in conflict with the interests of teachers and trustees who may have as their interest to hang tough in order to ensure that they get what it is they're after.

There are no restrictions as to when a strike may occur, and from a student perspective -- strikes generally take place in the spring. That's only natural. The hockey players, when they decided to go on strike, went on strike at the playoffs. Strikes conducted during the spring are conducted at a time when students are more sensitive to lost class time.

One of the things that I proposed in my private member's bill was that we appoint a student interests advocate. That would be someone who would formally represent the interests of students during the course of a strike. That advocate's costs would be paid for by the trustees and the teachers involved in the strike.

The advocate's responsibility would be to attend the negotiations and to bring to bear the interest of students, which really never deviates, which is to return to the classroom. That advocate would not be permitted to comment on those negotiations outside the negotiating room to the public. However, the student interests advocate would have an obligation weekly to report to the public as to the impact the strike was having on the students.

Something else that students would probably favour, were they given the chance to be involved in these kinds of things, is some kind of minimum term for a contract. Many terms that are being negotiated right now and in the past have been one year in length. Obviously, if that could be extended, that would minimize the frequency of collective negotiations and the possibility of a strike.

To sum up, I think it's important not to forget that what we're dealing with here is not simply an equation involving the rights of teachers to bargain freely, collectively for their wages and benefits and to exercise the right to strike, and on the other hand the right of our school boards to bargain as well and to lock teachers out. There's another component just as important which has to be brought into the equation, and that is the right of our students to attend their classes.

I hope we will use this opportunity, and the minister specifically will use this opportunity, to consider formally debating this issue perhaps through a standing committee of this House so that we can address these issues and in particular the impact that strikes are having on students and the shortfalls that are found within Bill 100 from a student perspective.

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Mr Beer: I'd like to commend the remarks that my colleague from Ottawa South has made. I think again it just underlines the need for us to be looking at how we can make a system better that, by and large, has functioned reasonably well and particularly take into account some of the problems we've been experiencing over the last couple of years.

One of the things indeed that's interesting in what we call the Knott report really relates to one of the questions he addressed, and that is putting together the best practices in labour relations in the educational sector. One of the things that teachers, trustees and others said was necessary was to really sit down and look at how other sectors handle certain kinds of problems. The recommendation read: "That a select committee of school board, teacher and non-teacher unionized staff, and Ministry of Education and Training personnel be appointed to develop as soon as possible a guidebook of the best practices in human resource development and labour relations and that the best practices be recommended to the stakeholders."

It's as if sometimes we're afraid to look at the new approaches that have been developed or to look at things that are going on in the private sector. I think what the member for Ottawa South, both in terms of his private member's bill last year and his remarks today, is directing us to is simply that there's something very different in labour relations in this sector around how we make sure that the rights of students are met and their education is not placed in jeopardy. That requires more public discussion at the present time.

The Deputy Speaker: Any further questions or comments? If not, the member for Ottawa South, you have two minutes to reply.

Mr McGuinty: I thank my friend the critic for his comments. I just want to emphasize one point I made earlier, and that is that under the existing system, as a result of Bill 100, every year in Ontario approximately 50,000 students are kept out of their classes for about one month. I do not feel that those are acceptable losses in 1993 in this province.

I am not prepared to accept that we cannot improve upon the existing system. I think there exists a tremendous amount of goodwill within our teaching body and within our trustees. Remarkable headway has been made in other areas where collective negotiations have been in use and I'm certain that, from a student perspective, we can do a better job.

The Acting Speaker (Ms Margaret Harrington): Are there any other members who wish to participate in the debate?

Mr Ernie L. Eves (Parry Sound): It's an opportunity for me to speak not only about this particular bill and this particular piece of legislation, but as it relates as well to a strike in East Parry Sound by the elementary teachers in that jurisdiction.

First of all, I'd like to say with respect to the legislation, as you've already heard, that it would appear as if members from all three parties are going to be supporting this legislation introduced in the House this afternoon. I'm a little concerned, though, like my colleague the member for Waterloo North and like the member for York North and others who have spoken, about the process we seem to have to go through with respect to Bill 100 before we get to the ultimate point where we finally realize -- some of us would argue we've always realized -- that the education system, after all, exists for the education of students. It is their welfare and their education that should be our primary concern in the system.

I understand that teachers have a position in Lambton and that the board has a position; in East Parry Sound the teachers have a position and the board has a position. But surely these disputes should not be resolved at the expense of damaging the education of students in our system, wherever they may be in the province of Ontario. Surely that should be first and foremost in everybody's mind.

My good colleague the Education critic for our party, the member for London North, has been on her feet on several occasions with respect to this particular strike, as indeed have local members on the government side on several occasions, and they should be concerned.

Sometimes we get so caught up in process, and in this case the board and the teachers are so caught up in process, and who's right and who's wrong about particular issues, that we overlook the fundamental point of the system, which is educating our young people.

It's going to be awfully difficult for these young people, who are on a semester system to start with, having lost, as the ERC says in its report today to the minister, 16% of their year -- but they've actually lost 32% of this semester -- to make up their education for the remainder of the semester and of the school year.

I'd like to point out that I have lived through one of these in West Parry Sound shortly after I was first elected in 1982. That dispute lasted some 51 instructional days, three months, from approximately the beginning of February -- I think it was February 8 -- until April 30. Animosity builds up in the community, and especially in small communities, animosity builds up between teachers and parents, between board members and parents, between ratepayers, students and teachers. I don't think it serves anybody's purpose to have to go through that type of dispute.

I would also hope the minister would take into account that it seems as if the ERC, the board and the OSSTF, in the case of the Lambton dispute, have all agreed that the students' educational year is deemed to be in jeopardy, and that's why we have this legislation we have before us this afternoon.

I would agree with the comments made by the members for York North and Waterloo North that surely it is time to do some fine-tuning or refinements, if nothing else, to Bill 100. I really think we have to assess the system we have in place. I've looked at the minister's legislation before us today and, as I pointed out very briefly after he made his statement in the House earlier this afternoon, his legislation is perhaps somewhat different than that of some of his predecessors.

On the one hand, I take issue with it in that it does not definitively state in the legislation what dispute resolution mechanism the minister will be using at the end of the day. I have some serious concerns about whether we should be doing this by way of regulation or order in council as opposed to putting it and stating it openly in the legislation. But I do think there are some beneficial aspects to the legislation the way he's drafted it and I would ask him to consider -- especially with respect to not only this dispute but other disputes, such as, as I'm sure he's more than aware, and I know he's aware because I've talked to him every day since the dispute started in East Parry Sound on October 6 -- perhaps using this sort of mechanism to resolve disputes earlier than has been the tradition established by the ERC.

If the parties indeed are going to be given an opportunity to go back to the negotiating table with a mediator, if need be -- and I imagine the need would be any time you're going to take this type of action -- then I would ask him to seriously consider whether or not he and the government should perhaps be moving earlier than normally has been the traditional case, and if the ERC should be moving a bit earlier.

I hope I am wrong, but I can see a situation developing in East Parry Sound where we may well be back here standing in this Legislature two and a half weeks from now when they amass 27, 28 or 30 days of instruction lost and go through a similar exercise. The two parties in that dispute have not been talking at the bargaining table for several weeks now. I understand mediation has been talked about and that dates have been offered, but the earliest date offered is November 3 or 4, which is next Wednesday or Thursday. So that'll be another seven, eight, nine, 10 days lost in the students' educational year, and we're into the 14th day today.

So now we're going to be into the mid to late 20s in terms of instructional days lost on those students in East Parry Sound before we're anywhere close to resolving this dispute. Unfortunately, the students are going to lose this time, and we'll be back here doing the same thing about the East Parry Sound situation.

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Somehow it has to be impressed upon both sides of that dispute, and of all disputes, that the ERC is serious about students not losing instructional time, that the ministry and the minister are serious about students not losing instructional time and indeed that the Legislature as a whole is very serious about students not losing very valuable instruction time.

Having been through this exercise, as I said, once before, in 1982 for some three months, my personal experience was one of great frustration, as I'm sure the local member's in this case was as well. It seemed to me that although the ERC was well-meaning, it doesn't seem to get around to the business or the issue of getting a dispute, whatever dispute it is, resolved as soon as possible so that the students can get back to the classroom and resume their education. After all, that's what the system is all about.

I understand that the parties have differences of opinion. In the east Parry Sound dispute, for example, the teachers have been working without a contract since August 1992, which is some 14 months. The two parties first started to talk in February 1992, I think it was. That's almost two years ago.

There has to be some modification of the system the way we know it now that will bring about a mechanism to ensure that the parties take the issue seriously, deal with it expeditiously and, most important of all, so that students do not lose valuable time in the classroom and do not lose a substantial chunk of their educational year.

As I said, we will be supporting the legislation that the minister has introduced this afternoon. I wish the minister had indicated in the legislation what dispute resolution mechanism will be implemented, because I think that would help to bring some pressure to bear -- if I might put it that way, a not-so-diplomatic term -- upon the two sides so the dispute indeed will be resolved as soon as possible; and hopefully by agreement, but if not, I guess there are other ways of resolving disputes for parties who will not take their job of getting down to resolving the differences seriously and in an expeditious manner.

As I said, we will be supporting the legislation, and I would urge the minister to consider what I've said with respect to not only the East Parry Sound dispute but other disputes as well. I understand we have a few problems in Essex South and perhaps other parts of the province as well. I think a message has to be sent to both sides that we are indeed serious at the Ministry of Education and Training, in the Legislature of Ontario and in the Education Relations Commission about students not losing time in the classroom.

Mr Elston: There are other issues that come to mind during the discussion of this bill, and they've been touched on in part by the member for Parry Sound. It really is a concern to me that, at a time when so many changes have occurred and are occurring in our education system and in the relationships between boards, the imposition of the social contract I think really led to another series of undermining pressures in the system. For those people who were already involved, as this Lambton board was with its teachers and the teachers with the Lambton board, in trying to come to terms with some problems they experience, the social contract ended up, in my view, causing them stresses which were largely unable to be overcome.

It seems to me that the strange imposition of the will of the central government, in this case the provincial government, has really led to the firming up of resolve, perhaps on both sides, not to be seen to be losing the advantage, each for their own constituencies.

It is very difficult to be working in the Ontario public sector or quasi-public sector and be the subject matter of the social contract and to appear, as a member of the executive of your union or association, that you haven't been taken to the cleaners in some way by the pressures of the social contract, without then coming to a bargaining table and agreeing to dispense with all the discussions that have caused tension inside your membership over perhaps a year or more, in this case about 22 months.

It's a concern to me as well that the board of education, which is also under stress from the ratepayers in Lambton, as is every board around the province, would be seen to be somehow bending to the will of some other organization if it gave up its ground.

It seems to me that the social contract hardened the resolve of each side not to look like it was being beaten. That being the case, I don't know what other resolution could possibly have come but the particular steps taken by the Minister of Education. I'd like some comments from the member for Parry Sound.

The Acting Speaker: Are there any other members who wish to participate in questions and/or comments to the member for Parry Sound? I recognize the member for Ottawa South -- sorry, Carleton.

Mr Norman W. Sterling (Carleton): Carleton actually includes all of the other ridings, so I guess I can speak for all of them this afternoon.

I'd just like to draw attention to the member for Parry Sound's points with regard to outlining in the bill the actual process for the resolution of this dispute. I remember back to the Carleton Board of Education dispute: I thought that if the government at the time had taken leadership early on to set out a procedure of final-choice arbitration, perhaps all of the hostility which developed between the board and the teachers would have been done away with.

Since Bill 100 has been introduced in this Legislature and passed in this Legislature, there have been quite a number of strikes. Quite frankly, I think the public and the taxpayers have probably come to the conclusion that the teaching profession has done very well by Bill 100. I'm not certain that giving the right to strike to teachers has worked to the advantage of the students, and the member for Parry Sound has repeated that theme throughout his remarks.

I think we have to put the focus back on the students, that this is a system for the students and not the teaching profession and not the trustees; it's for the students. I think we have to consider very seriously the whole dispute resolution mechanism with regard to it taking place across the province in different boards or whether we would be better off doing it for the whole province in an arbitration fashion.

The Acting Speaker: Are there any other members who wish to participate in questions and/or comments? If not, the member for Parry Sound has two minutes to respond.

Mr Eves: The comments made by the member for Carleton are indeed things the minister should be taking into account. There must be a better way to deal with these disputes while at the same time ensuring the education of our young people.

The Acting Speaker: Are there any other members who wish to participate in this debate?

Mr Huget: It's a pleasure for me to rise today and participate in this very important debate. First of all, let me say that I welcome the introduction of this legislation. The strike of Lambton county secondary school teachers has created a very difficult situation in my community and for all concerned in my community. I think it should be understood that the strike is now in its 30th day, and it follows a strike of three years ago which lasted 10 days. It has become clear that the parties are not able to reach local agreement.

Secondary students in my community have been unable to attend classes since the strike began on September 14, and many of those are now in danger of losing their year. I think it should be noted as well that the strike has caused a very high level of concern in the Sarnia area. I have to tell you that the frustration being experienced and expressed by parents and students in my riding is at levels the like of which I've never experienced. There's a great deal of uncertainty, a great deal of anxiety in terms of the situation that currently exists in Sarnia-Lambton, and parents and students throughout this process have been telling me very forcefully that this strike must end.

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The parties themselves have publicly acknowledged that without the deadlines imposed by this legislation, no settlement is likely. In fact I'd like to quote from the Education Relations Commission report, which says,

"While the OSSTF has historically expressed profound aversion to government intervention in collective bargaining by way of back-to-work legislation, OSSTF took a clear and public position during the inquiry, stating that back-to-work legislation would be appropriate in this situation because of the apparent inability of the parties to conclude their own collective agreement in the near future."

The involvement of the Education Relations Commission with Sarnia-Lambton has been extensive. They've been very actively involved in trying to resolve this dispute in playing a very constructive role throughout the whole process. The commission is now saying that there is no prospect of a settlement and the voice of the commission itself has been added to those of Lambton county residents who call for legislation to reopen classrooms and resume the education of students.

We believe strongly in the rights of workers to collectively bargain. The negotiating process has been given every opportunity to succeed in Lambton county. The Education Relations Commission has done everything it could to bring a resolution. But it is clear, and both the board and the teachers have said this, that only through legislation will the stalemate be broken.

I want to refer to two letters that were in the local newspaper in the letters to the editor section of the newspaper. They're both from students. The first one reads:

"I, along with 6,700 students in high school, am experiencing what would seem to many teenagers as a dream come true: a teachers' strike. However, most students from Lambton county have learned where our priorities really are. The strike is doing nothing good for us, and teachers' strikes are nothing less than a recurring nightmare.

"For the first few days of such strikes, we can kid ourselves it feels like a miracle. We think, no dreadful homework, no nasty professors reciting to us pointless information, just huge parties until 3 am on week nights and sleeping in until it's time again to go cruising around town with our friends. What more could a teenager want?

"At the time of this writing, it's been three weeks that we've been out of school and the novelty of unrestricted socializing and staying up all night has worn off. No one really cares to call someone else any more because all that can be done has been done at least twice already and we almost prefer to be bored alone. Pathetically enough, daytime television seems more exciting than sitting on the doorstep with a friend who's just as weary and mentally dead as you.

"The strike doesn't seem close to being over yet, so we continue to wait, wait and wait. Instead of doing absolutely nothing, some students have resorted to putting pressure on the teachers' union as well as on the Lambton County Board of Education. Nearly 300 high schoolers have gathered twice for demonstrations to stress even further the point that we are the victims in a selfish battle that no one truly wins.

"We don't care who is victorious, all we want is to be back in the classroom. Is that too much to ask for?"

The second letter, also from an OAC student, reads:

"The sound of hallways buzzing with activity; the ring of the bell sends people scurrying; the quiet hush as classes begin. I never thought I would miss those familiar sounds, but I do. Those hallways stand empty now, the desks sit vacant and the bells ring meaninglessly.

"I was, we all were, looking forward to this school year. This is my last year at Northern Collegiate. The final year is when the most important educational information is learned so career choices can be finalized. Isn't it also supposed to be filled with fond memories of crowded football games, social engagements and lasting friendships? All of these things are impossible to accomplish without going to school.

"It makes me upset to think that my future is in the hands of the board and the teachers' union. I had hoped both groups had the best interests of the students in mind, but I am positive now that we are not even a concern. Power, control and money are the issues in this strike, but there is no price you can put on an education.

"Is this really what our society has become? We the students are the future of this country. Education provides us with the necessary tools in order to make this world a better place. Without an education there will be empty minds and there is nothing more dangerous than ignorance."

This legislation before the House today will require the immediate resumption of classes. Legislation will encourage the parties to continue to attempt to resolve the dispute and the legislation will provide for a dispute resolution mechanism if the parties do not agree. It would be irresponsible for this House not to act.

The two letters I quoted in this House are just two of literally hundreds and hundreds that I have received from parents and students who are extremely distressed about the effect of this strike on their education. I can say categorically it has disturbed many, many families in terms of their ordinary and daily family routines as well as disturbed and upset the educating process of students in my community.

I again say it would be irresponsible for this House not to act and, in closing, I urge all members of this House to support the speedy passage of this bill which will allow students to get back to school and will at the same time allow the parties another opportunity to settle their differences. That's what I like about this legislation. It opens the schools immediately and it provides a process and a mechanism for the board and the teachers to resolve their own issues.

I have heard in this House, from all parties in this House, the importance of local boards and teachers arriving at their own solutions, and that's what this legislation will enable them to do. As well, it provides that the parties -- both parties, the board and the teachers -- by May 1994 will file a joint proposal outlining the steps they will take to improve their relationship.

As I stated earlier in my speech here this afternoon, this is not the first experience that our community has had with strikes. It's something we've got to learn in our community to deal with a lot better. There's a relationship that needs to be forged and built and nurtured and concentrated on in terms of getting to a situation where we don't have to deal with a labour dispute and a strike each and every time this board and these teachers sit down to negotiate anything. There's a clear need that, I think, while you can't legislate cooperation and you can't legislate agreement, you can certainly set the stage and provide some leadership for those types of initiatives to begin in Lambton county.

I know the ministry and the Education Relations Commission stand prepared today to do everything they can to assist that process of rebuilding and of looking for new ways to resolve differences without putting every single student in Lambton county at risk each and every time there's an item that needs to be resolved.

I believe this legislation is progressive. I believe it will, in the short term, solve the immediate problem of getting our students back into school and at the same time deal with the process issues, allow for more collective bargaining and build a plan for the future, a plan that this county and its students, the board and teachers, desperately need to find.

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The Acting Speaker: Now is the time for members to respond to the member for Sarnia if they would wish to take the floor for two minutes. Are there any members who wish to respond?

Mr Elston: I was interested in, very close to the end of the member's speech, the word "progressive" being added to this legislation. I've been here for just over 12 years now, and this is the first time I think I have ever heard a member of the New Democratic Party call this sort of legislation progressive. I do understand what he means. In a practical sense, if you don't have this legislation, the stalemate continues.

I was struck as I was listening to the debate and going through some of my mail by a piece about public education from the OSSTF, which is a compilation of its presentation to the commission talking about the four principles of education: access for all, opportunity for all, achievement for all and value for all. Of course the first two of those were really quite lacking in the Lambton situation. If you can't get to school, there is no access. If you can't get to school, there is no opportunity. If there is no school, there is no achievement at all, and obviously, there is no value in the system if it is not functioning.

My concern is that over the long haul there are going to be more questions raised about this incident as a backdrop to further discussion about what many people are raising as concerns about our education system, about whether or not those four principles are being met at all by our current system. They may very well use the experience in Lambton, either this year's experience or the experience from three years ago, an experience in Guelph or several other places, to figure out whether or not our system is actually doing the right thing for our pupils. I think there are a lot of parents out there who are disappointed, and perhaps this experience may be one of the foundation points for a real discussion.

The Acting Speaker: Are there any other members who wish to participate in questions and/or comments? If not, the member for Sarnia has two minutes to respond.

Mr Huget: I certainly would like to deal with a couple of the comments made by the member for Bruce. While he and I may disagree on the use of the term "progressive," I would certainly hope he would agree that this legislation is, at the very least, innovative in terms of how it attempts to deal and in fact will deal with a very serious situation.

At the same time that it puts students back in the school, it allows for the collective bargaining process to continue. At the same time it does that, it makes the board and the teachers come to agreement on how they will deal with the loss of instructional time. At the same time it does that, it asks the board and the teachers to create a plan to avoid these kinds of situations in the future.

I would say that would be innovative and, I suppose, in my own way, with limited knowledge of the English language, somewhat progressive in its approach.

I am very concerned about a continuing pattern of labour disputes in my community as it involves this particular board and its teachers. Parents in my riding have indicated to me very, very clearly and very loudly that they want their children in school, they want the teachers they pay to teach to be in fact teaching, and they are far less patient with these kinds of disputes than they may have been, if they ever were, in the past.

They would like their children to receive a quality education. They recognize that it costs money. They would like their boards of education, and indeed the Ministry of Education, to be cost-effective and cost-efficient in delivery of those educational services, but not at the expense of quality.

They've made it very clear to me that as taxpayers they recognize that quality education costs dollars, and if they can be assured that their children are getting the best possible education provided by the best possible instructors, they will indeed continue to pay those tax dollars, so I think the issue of disputes and a plan for the future to avoid disputes is very much an important part of this solution.

The Acting Speaker: Are there any further members who wish to participate in second reading debate on Bill 109? Seeing none, would the minister wish to respond?

Hon Mr Cooke: I'll be very brief. I want to thank the members who have participated in the debate this afternoon. I specifically want to thank the members from Lambton and Sarnia who, through this very difficult time, have certainly been very strong in their support for the students in Lambton county and have on a regular basis been raising concerns as they relate to their constituents, concerns that parents have been raising with them as a result of this very difficult situation.

All of us who have been MPPs for a while know that representing a riding where there is a labour dispute involving teachers and boards is extremely difficult, to say the least. I want to pay tribute to the two members, who have I think remained very calm and professional in their dealings with this but have been very tough and strong advocates on behalf of the students in Sarnia and Lambton.

I also want to make one final point. I really believe that this legislation offers an opportunity to the board and the teachers to work out a local solution, at the same time providing for the students to get back to the schools and the kids to get back to regular school days.

I represent an area in Windsor where, back in the 1970s, we had a couple of very difficult disputes between the board and the teachers at the time, and it took a long time to repair the relationships between the board and the teachers. I can tell you, and certainly the parties in Lambton, that it's a lot easier to maintain and improve your relationships if you settle these kinds of disputes at the bargaining table. That opportunity's been provided to them again, and I encourage them to do so.

I also very much encourage the parties to use the section of the act that provides for a process to be put in place to work on preventive mediation or a process to improve the working relationship between the board and the teachers. That is essential for the quality of education in Lambton county and to make sure that this very difficult circumstance does not repeat itself again. I hope the parties will take that seriously; it's their responsibility to do so, and the law calls for that to happen.

With those few final comments, I would move second reading of Bill 109.

The Acting Speaker: Mr Cooke has moved second reading of Bill 109, An Act to settle The Lambton County Board of Education and Teachers Dispute.

Is it the pleasure of the House that the motion carry?

All those in favour of the motion will please say "aye."

All those opposed to the motion will please say "nay."

In my opinion, the ayes have it.

Call in the members.

The division bells rang from 1709 to 1739.

The Acting Speaker (Mr Noble Villeneuve): Mr Cooke has moved second reading of Bill 109, An Act to settle The Lambton County Board of Education and Teachers Dispute. All those in favour of Mr Cooke's motion will please rise one at a time and be recognized by the clerk.

Ayes

Allen, Beer, Bisson, Boyd, Bradley, Buchanan, Callahan, Carr, Carter, Charlton, Chiarelli, Churley, Cleary, Conway, Cooke, Cooper, Coppen, Cousens, Eddy, Elston, Eves, Farnan, Fawcett, Frankford, Gigantes, Grandmaître, Haeck, Hansen, Harnick, Harrington, Harris, Haslam, Hayes, Henderson, Hope, Huget, Jamison, Johnson (Don Mills), Johnson (Prince Edward-Lennox-South Hastings), Jordan, Klopp, Kwinter, Lankin, Laughren;

Lessard, Mackenzie, MacKinnon, Mahoney, Malkowski, Marchese, Martel, McGuinty, McLean, Miclash, Mills, Morin, Murdoch (Grey-Owen Sound), Murdock (Sudbury), Murphy, North, O'Connor, O'Neill (Ottawa-Rideau), Owens, Perruzza, Philip (Etobicoke-Rexdale), Phillips (Scarborough-Agincourt), Pilkey, Poole, Pouliot, Rae, Ramsay, Rizzo, Runciman, Silipo, Sorbara, Sterling, Sullivan, Sutherland, Swarbrick, Tilson, Turnbull, Ward, Waters, Wessenger, White, Wilson (Frontenac-Addington), Wilson (Kingston and The Islands), Winninger, Wiseman, Witmer, Wood, Ziemba.

The Acting Speaker: All those opposed to Mr Cooke's motion, please rise one at a time.

Clerk of the House (Mr Claude L. DesRosiers): The ayes are 92; the nays 0.

The Acting Speaker: I declare the motion carried.

The bill was also given third reading on motion.

PROVINCIAL OFFENCES STATUTE LAW AMENDMENT ACT, 1993 / LOI DE 1993 MODIFIANT DES LOIS EN CE QUI CONCERNE LES INFRACTIONS PROVINCIALES

Resuming the adjourned debate on the motion for second reading of Bill 47, An Act to amend certain Acts in respect of the Administration of Justice / Projet de loi 47, Loi modifiant certaines lois en ce qui concerne l'administration de la justice.

The Acting Speaker (Mr Noble Villeneuve): The honourable member for Willowdale had the floor when we last debated this bill.

Mr Charles Harnick (Willowdale): I concluded the last day by indicating that there were some ways in which we could make this a better bill. One of the things I said was, quite simply, that rather than direct photo-radar at the licence plate only, we should direct it at the driver of the vehicle.

The technology exists so that the driver of the vehicle can be identified. If the driver can't be identified, then the owner would be liable to pay the fine. But if the driver could be identified and a photograph taken so that the owner identified the driver, then we at least are convicting the person who really committed the offence.

If you want to deter people from driving at high speeds, then you had best deter the operator of the vehicle, not the person who might be sitting at home when his vehicle is being used by someone else. That only makes very clear and good sense.

It also answers the question about whether this is just another tax grab. If you're really intent on making this bill directed towards safety and slower speeds on our highways, then convict the operator of the vehicle, not necessarily the owner, who may not be the operator. Otherwise, it really is nothing more than a revenue tax grab, with the revenues not being dedicated to the safety of our highways and safety of people using the roads and highways around Ontario. I don't think, as the bill is now structured, that real deterrence is there. The technology exists to take a photograph of the actual driver, and that's the way this should be directed.

There are a couple of other things in this bill that cause me some concern. One of those things is the idea that a justice will now be in a position to order that any permit "in respect of which a suspension is authorized" -- and I emphasize these words -- "under any act because of non-payment of the fine be suspended until the fine is paid."

The Speaker (Hon David Warner): There are a number of private conversations in the chamber and it would be appreciated if those conversations could be taken elsewhere. The member for Willowdale, with the floor.

Mr Harnick: Let me tell you what this means. What this essentially means is that if I have a licence to be a plumber, and if there's an act that authorizes who can be a plumber and that act says if I'm in arrears of any fines my licence to be a plumber is to be taken away, then if I have a fine of any kind under the Provincial Offences Act as it's now being amended, then my licence to make a living is taken away.

Mr David Winninger (London South): Baloney.

Mr Harnick: The member for London South says, "Baloney," because he says that some bureaucrat he spoke with said something about this and assured him it wasn't true. If you read the applicable sections, and it appears in more than one place in this bill as it's being amended, it says "a suspension is authorized under any act."

If the suspension is authorized under an act that licenses plumbers, then those plumbers have their licence taken away. That is not their driver's licence, which would be quite a proper thing, but their licence to practise their profession.

I happen to know that when we get into bills like the Family Support Plan Act, many professional people are, quite improperly, in arrears of family support payments. If they are professional people and they can have their licences suspended in order to get the fine paid, it is exactly the same thing, and I happen to know that's what this government is advocating.

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Mr Winninger: You're wrong.

Mr Harnick: The member for London South says I'm wrong. Well, I happened to speak to the Attorney General before making this allegation. It's more than an allegation because she told me that I was absolutely right in my interpretation, and I spoke with her late last week to clarify this point.

I have some misgivings about how far-reaching this particular piece of legislation is. When someone is in arrears of paying a parking ticket, I don't think their job should be in jeopardy. That should not affect their licence to work.

This particular bill can authorize that to happen if any other act is amended accordingly. The government is now in a position to do just that. If they do it here, they will do it with other bills, and I just don't think that's correct.

The other aspect of this bill, and it really is quite an omnibus bill, is that there are some situations in which people now must appear when they go to court the first time. If they intend to plead not guilty, they now have to go and appear personally or have an agent appear personally for them in first-appearance court.

We in Ontario left that behind in terms of provincial offences several years ago. Now what we are going to be doing is having an extra court to deal with setting trial dates in the event that someone doesn't wish to plead guilty to an offence. Again, I think that is a step in the wrong direction.

I'll tell you another thing where the government can deal with some of these problems. A constituent of mine went to have his licence sticker renewed. He went to have his licence sticker renewed, but because he had a parking ticket, they would not renew -- and quite properly -- his licence.

The fact is he had appealed the conviction on the parking ticket. He brought the notice of appeal into the licensing office, and they told him, "You cannot have your licence renewed until you pay the fine." He tried to explain: "I am not guilty. I have appealed. I will be guilty if I lose the appeal, but until then I am not guilty."

Nevertheless, he could not renew his licence and must pay the fine in order to get his sticker, even though the appeal is pending and comes up after the renewal date. I urge the Attorney General, and I have spoken to her about this, to deal with this matter.

Those in effect are the remarks that I have to make on this bill. Particularly dealing with photo-radar, there are many things the government can do to make this bill better. I urge the Minister of Transportation to read the remarks I made last time, to use the technology that's available, to convict the driver. The technology is there to do that. Don't just take photographs of the licence plate. If you really want to deter, convict the people who are actually operating the vehicles.

The Speaker: I appreciate the member for Willowdale's contribution to the debate and invite any questions and/or comments. Seeing none, the Minister of Northern Development and Mines.

Hon Shelley Martel (Minister of Northern Development and Mines): Mr Speaker, His Honour awaits to give royal assent.

The Speaker: His Honour awaits royal assent, so we shall await the arrival of His Honour.

His Honour the Lieutenant Governor of Ontario entered the chamber of the Legislative Assembly and took his seat upon the throne.

ROYAL ASSENT / SANCTION ROYALE

Hon Henry N.R. Jackman (Lieutenant Governor): Pray be seated.

The Speaker (Hon David Warner): May it please Your Honour, the Legislative Assembly of the province has, at its present meetings thereof, passed certain bills to which, in the name of and on behalf of the said Legislative Assembly, I respectfully request Your Honour's assent.

Clerk Assistant and Clerk of Committees (Ms Deborah Deller): The following are the titles of the bills to which Your Honour's assent is prayed:

Bill 7, An Act to amend certain Acts related to Municipalities concerning Waste Management / Projet de loi 7, Loi modifiant certaines lois relatives aux municipalités en ce qui concerne la gestion des déchets

Bill 42, An Act to provide for Farm Registration and Funding for Farm Organizations that provide Education and Analysis of Farming Issues on behalf of Farmers / Projet de loi 42, Loi prévoyant l'inscription des entreprises agricoles et le financement des organismes agricoles qui offrent des services d'éducation et d'analyse en matière de questions agricoles pour le compte des agriculteurs

Clerk of the House (Mr Claude L. DesRosiers): In Her Majesty's name, His Honour the Lieutenant Governor doth assent to these bills.

Au nom de Sa Majesté, Son Honneur le lieutenant-gouverneur sanctionne ces projets de loi.

His Honour was then pleased to retire.

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The Speaker: Pursuant to standing order 34, the question that this House do now adjourn is deemed to have been made.

SOCIAL ASSISTANCE

The Speaker (Hon David Warner): The member for Bruce has given notice of his dissatisfaction with the answer to a question to the Premier. The member for Bruce has up to five minutes to debate the matter and the Premier has up to five minutes for his reply. The honourable member for Bruce.

Mr Murray J. Elston (Bruce): I probably won't take five minutes, although there are several things that must be said about this issue in this House.

Basically, I raised a question last week about concerns that I have seen reported in a newspaper article from the Vancouver Sun, again repeated in a copy of the Ottawa Citizen, which has claimed that several millions of dollars annually leave this country, the money having been first obtained by multiple applications for welfare by certain people in the province.

My concerns in raising the issue were several, but primarily the fact that our welfare system allegedly was being systematically relieved of its funds by a group that had decided it was going to use those funds internationally to help with the acquisition of arms and other commodities for the conduct of violence in another country concerns me greatly. It concerns me greatly because we have peacekeepers in several countries around the world who are doing a job which is designed to alleviate suffering and problems in those areas.

The particular issue I raised dealt with a report in the Vancouver Sun that dealt with the Somali community, and of course the aggression that has gone on there is among individuals from various clans. The fighting which has occurred and which now has taken the lives of scores of peacekeepers from countries other than Canada who are there, including a US military personnel, including Nigerians and including Pakistanis, really causes a great deal of concern on my part.

The interest that I had secondly was focused on the fact that our welfare system, which has been subject to an increase which I think a good number of people in the province have found to be unacceptable, it appears could find some relief if the fraud that was being alleged was occurring was constrained and that the integrity of the entire operation would then be much more happily funded by the taxpayers.

I asked the question of the Premier and I was charged with having exhibited synthetic indignation over the concern that money was leaving the taxpayers' treasury of this province for the purpose of buying weapons for people in other parts of the world. I was charged that I shouldn't do anything that would isolate a particular group that was alleged to be involved in this activity unless I had something more than a newspaper report.

There are several activities that are going on these days I think under the auspices of a number of organizations which are suggesting that there is an organized effort to take money from our welfare system and transfer it to other organizations internationally.

There are, in my view, therefore several reasons why the Premier should have responded to me in ways that differed from the manner in which he ultimately enjoined my question. He should have explained to us what steps were being taken by the people with respect to welfare fraud.

In fact previously, in May 1992 I believe it was, the then minister, Marion Boyd, the member for London Centre, had indicated that she, on behalf of the Ministry of Community and Social Services, was going to hire some 450 people. Later it was confirmed by the current Minister of Community and Social Services that several people had been hired to deal with welfare fraud. They felt they were going to save upwards of maybe $16 million in the upcoming fiscal year, or maybe that's for the whole fiscal year, I think starting this past April.

The Premier didn't give me any satisfaction that he even knew about the allegations, which were obviously well known in other parts of the government. He didn't tell us what steps he was taking, what was possibly being done to make sure that any efforts were being curtailed to take money from the welfare system of our great province to do these other acts internationally.

I'm concerned by that. I wanted the people to know that the Premier should have been more forthcoming with us to explain that he was protecting the taxpayers, that he was in fact protecting the peacekeepers in those other areas by making sure that our welfare system was not funding those things.

I didn't hear it. I give him the opportunity now to reply and give us some sense that action has been taken.

The Speaker: The member's time has expired. The Premier is not present nor is the Deputy Premier. No other member is permitted to respond under the standing orders. There being no further matter to be debated, this House stands adjourned until 1:30 of the clock tomorrow.

The House adjourned at 1807.

October 26, 1993

MEMBERS' STATEMENTS

TORONTO BLUE JAYS

NORTH YORK PERFORMING ARTS CENTRE

POLITICAL PARTY LEADERS

JOHN TORY

HUSKY INJECTION MOLDING

MIDDLESEX FARM HIKER TOUR

SUPPORTS TO EMPLOYMENT PROGRAM

PORNOGRAPHY

CANCER PREVENTION

STATEMENTS BY THE MINISTRY AND RESPONSES

TEACHERS' DISPUTE

ORAL QUESTIONS

JOB CREATION

WORKERS' COMPENSATION BOARD

CORPORATION FILING PROGRAM

HEALTH SERVICES

SOCIAL CONTRACT

COCHLEAR IMPLANTS

MUNICIPAL LEGISLATION

ALGONQUIN PROVINCIAL PARK

PROPOSED TRADE CENTRE

EMPLOYMENT EQUITY

PORNOGRAPHY

INTRODUCTION OF BILLS

LAMBTON COUNTY BOARD OF EDUCATION AND TEACHERS DISPUTE SETTLEMENT ACT, 1993 / LOI DE 1993 SUR LE RÈGLEMENT DU CONFLIT ENTRE LE CONSEIL DE L'ÉDUCATION APPELÉ THE LAMBTON COUNTY BOARD OF EDUCATION ET SES ENSEIGNANTS

EMPLOYER HEALTH TAX AMENDMENT ACT, 1993 / LOI DE 1993 MODIFIANT LA LOI SUR L'IMPÔT PRÉLEVÉ SUR LES EMPLOYEURS RELATIF AUX SERVICES DE SANTÉ

ORDERS OF THE DAY

LAMBTON COUNTY BOARD OF EDUCATION AND TEACHERS DISPUTE SETTLEMENT ACT, 1993 / LOI DE 1993 SUR LE RÈGLEMENT DU CONFLIT ENTRE LE CONSEIL DE L'ÉDUCATION APPELÉ THE LAMBTON COUNTY BOARD OF EDUCATION ET SES ENSEIGNANTS

PROVINCIAL OFFENCES STATUTE LAW AMENDMENT ACT, 1993 / LOI DE 1993 MODIFIANT DES LOIS EN CE QUI CONCERNE LES INFRACTIONS PROVINCIALES

ROYAL ASSENT / SANCTION ROYALE

SOCIAL ASSISTANCE