Hansard Transcript 1993-Dec-14 vol. b | Legislative Assembly of Ontario

Bill 139, An Act to Settle a Dispute between The Board of Education for the City of Windsor and its Elementary School Teachers / Projet de loi 139, Loi visant à régler le conflit entre le conseil de l'éducation appelé The Board of Education for the City of Windsor et ses enseignants des écoles élémentaires.

The Acting Speaker (Mr Noble Villeneuve): Does the honourable minister have some opening remarks?

Hon David S. Cooke (Minister of Education and Training): Yes, Mr Speaker, I do.

As members are aware, 687 elementary school teachers employed by the Windsor Board of Education began a full withdrawal of services on November 8, 1993. Mediation talks supervised by the Education Relations Commission were held last week between the parties. On December 9, these talks broke off.

I invited representatives of the board and teachers to come to Queen's Park in yet another effort to resolve this dispute. The groups met yesterday and again this morning under the supervision of the Education Relations Commission. Unfortunately, this round of talks has not resolved the dispute. Clearly, we want this dispute to be resolved between the board and its elementary school teachers. This has been a difficult set of labour negotiations. Despite the best efforts of the mediator and the Education Relations Commission, no agreement has been forthcoming.

The government has the responsibility to ensure that labour disputes in the education sector do not endanger the school year of the affected students. A process which has been put in place for many years guides the determination of when a school year is in jeopardy. Central to that process is the Education Relations Commission. It is this body which must, after consulting with all parties involved, advise the minister when to bring in legislation to enable the return to classes.

The strike in Windsor is in its 26th day. The ERC has not advised that the school year is in jeopardy. In fact yesterday the commission reported to me, "There is no convincing evidence of jeopardy to the courses of study at this point in time." Nevertheless, this government feels the action must be taken to ensure that the strike does not continue past the point which will be detrimental to the elementary school students in Windsor.

Because this House is about to rise and not return until March, it is necessary for this government to act now to ensure that there is legislative means to get children back to the classroom at the point at which the Education Relations Commission declares the school year to be in jeopardy.

This legislation, when proclaimed, will bring about a return of elementary teachers to the classroom and provide a means of settling the matters that are now in dispute between the board and teachers. The legislation proposes a combination of arbitration and a final-offer selection process to resolve this dispute. Upon proclamation, this legislation will return teachers to the classroom and the terms of the old collective agreement will be restored, except for the staffing provisions.

A three-member arbitration panel will be convened to examine all matters remaining in dispute between the teachers and the board related to the local agreement entered into by the parties under the Social Contract Act, 1993. The decision of the arbitration board is required within 45 days after the act is proclaimed. All the issues which remain unsettled will be sent to final-offer selection for resolution.

I want to make it clear to the House that the legislation will only be proclaimed when the Education Relations Commission advises that the school year is in jeopardy. The act will come into effect only if a local solution to this dispute cannot be found or the ERC determines that the school year is threatened. The steps we are taking today are aimed at fulfilling our responsibilities and safeguarding the interest of the elementary school students in Windsor.

I'd just like to make a couple of comments as well that are not contained in the prepared statement I just read. This particular dispute has been extremely difficult for the board and the teachers, and I want to make a couple of points that I think are important for the members of the House to recognize.

First, this dispute is a result of a clear decision the board made earlier this year when it was setting its mill rate, before there was ever a thing called the expenditure control plan or before there was ever a thing called the Social Contract Act. The board made a clear political decision when it was setting its budget earlier this year that it would budget for drastic reductions in pay, in staffing etc and that, even though it had no means of implementing those decisions, those were the demands it would make.

They went through the process of negotiations. They asked for fact-finding to kick in earlier than would normally be the case during these negotiations, in order to get to the point where there would be either a resolution at the negotiating table or the process we are now engaged in. That is very clear on the record and certainly admitted to by the board.

In my view, it's very unfortunate that the board went further this fall and went to the point where it took unilateral action to change the collective agreement, as is provided for under Bill 100 but until this year was very, very unusual indeed.

In view of the circumstances of the House adjourning some time this week and in view of the fact that the strike is now in its fourth week, this Legislature obviously has to give or has to consider giving the government the power that, when Bill 100 kicks in and the Education Relations Commission declares jeopardy, if the parties have not sat down and negotiated an agreement, then the legislation will be proclaimed and this process for resolving the dispute will kick in.

I still believe -- and I've been extensively involved in the negotiations for this particular contract, especially in the last 36 hours -- that there is an agreement there waiting to be had. We were very close this morning. The will was not there to achieve an agreement. The best solution still is for the board and the teachers to determine themselves that they want to settle this dispute and then this legislation will never come into effect. They can settle this at the local level if the will is there to do it.

I hope the teachers will recognize some of the financial difficulties the board has, and they need to do that at the bargaining table. On the same level, the board needs to understand there are certain requirements that the teachers have as well. If both of them get to that point of understanding, an agreement can be achieved and this legislation will not be needed at all.

In the meantime, I ask for the support of the members of the Legislature for this bill so the students in the Windsor elementary school system are protected.

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The Acting Speaker: Questions or comments? Seeing none, further debate?

Mr Charles Beer (York North): I must say it is with a great sense of reluctance that we rise in the House to deal with the third strike where the government has legislated the teachers back to work: with reluctance because of what is happening with the collective bargaining system in the whole educational area. I don't know if it's struck the minister, but with each of these strikes, the bill in terms of the settlement gets longer; this one now some seven pages.

Clearly, we are all concerned about the young people and the education that they should be receiving. Clearly, we don't want this to go on beyond the point where it is and so we will be supporting the legislation, but we will be supporting it with great reluctance.

There are a number of comments that I want to make to the minister, and one is simply that this is now, as the minister knows, the third strike. We've had Lambton, we've had east Parry Sound elementary, and now Windsor. We were fortunate to be able to avoid having to come back with legislation with east Parry Sound secondary.

I think the problem that everyone has now is, what is the simple fact of there being these three pieces of legislation going to do to the collective bargaining process that is ongoing? Because what is happening is that people are looking and saying, "Well, what's the point of really bargaining, when we know that legislation will be brought into the House?"

There are other disputes out there. They raise a number of key issues and we don't seem to deal with the issues; we just simply set up a process. If you look at the time frame here, and we don't know when the Education Relations Commission will be bringing in a stand that the education of these young people is in jeopardy, this process will go on for a great deal of time. There are 45 days for the board of arbitration and then after that another 45 days for the selector.

The minister has gone to great pains to say that this all began well before the expenditure controls and well before the social contract. What the minister fails to recognize is the impact, none the less, that those two decisions by the government have had on the process, as we have got into it and over the last several months, and it continues with all of the discussions that are going on right now in the other areas.

Of particular concern, and the minister is aware of this, is the whole issue around the 60-day rule, and within the confines of the social contract legislation and the fact that this has to go forward until March 31, 1996, how we accommodate that particular problem, where teachers don't have the feeling that their contracts can be ripped open and all kinds of things can happen to them in a way that Bill 100 was really never intended to do.

By the same token, the concern -- and the Minister of Finance addressed this earlier in a question that I put to him -- is the school boards themselves really knowing: "What will our finances be? What kind of certainty do we have in planning our budgets, not only for the next year but for the year after and the year after that?"

The minister in effect has both the boards and the teachers by the nape of the neck. He controls what is happening, and we've got to see from this government a real attempt by it to sit down and try to make sure that these problems, many of which have been similar and have been common to all the disputes through the fall, are not going to occur and recur.

The minister says, "I don't want to come back before the House would normally come back in March," and we hope that for this purpose we don't. But we know that there are a number of discussions going on where there could be other work stoppages where that must happen.

The only way to deal with that, I think, is to give some real sense of certainty both to the teachers and to the boards in terms of what they have to work with, because if we hear one thing from teachers and one thing from boards, it's their uncertainty in dealing with the social contract legislation and what precisely that means to all the negotiations that are ongoing.

I would say as well to the minister that if I were a parent in Windsor, I might have been saying to myself: "Look, it's December 14. Hopefully this thing will be over at least so that after Christmas and after New Year's, my kids will be back in school."

We don't know that. The Education Relations Commission has said so far that the students' year is not in jeopardy. I think, as a parent and indeed just as a layperson, that many of us must have real problems in trying to say that if a student in a school can miss 26 days of school, 30 days of school, 35 days of school, how do we come to some meaningful understanding as to how relevant missing all those days is in terms of putting a child's education in jeopardy?

I'm sure the minister himself would say that he feels uneasy about what is the way of precisely defining that term. I'm not saying it's easy. I don't know whether it's 10 or 15, but I think we have to do a much better job. I suspect there's a sense out there that if we're saying it may be 25 or 30 or 35 or 40 days before the kids' year is in jeopardy, then what is it that we're doing, what does that say about our system and what kind of thinking do we have to bring to this to try to make sure that the kids of this province are going to get the education they need? That's one of the issues that is left standing, because by the time these young people are back to school it will have been in effect more than two months, from November 8, before that happens.

The other comment and one that caused us as a caucus a great deal of difficulty is that in effect this is back-to-work legislation, but back-to-work legislation with a difference because it doesn't kick in until there is a position taken by the Education Relations Commission, and there is a very complex process that is then put in place.

I think the fact that the minister has set out clearly, and it is important that he did so, what will happen at that time gives us some comfort that there is a process and that this will happen automatically. But it is still something where I think it is difficult in giving that approval where it's not a blank cheque, but it's none the less a cheque that is not fully set out in terms of all the decimal figures that are in it.

I say again to the minister that I hope very much that over the break he and his officials are able to sit down with officials from the school boards' association, from the teachers' federations to say: "Look, boys and girls, we can't go on this way where every month I have to bring in a piece of back-to-work legislation. The whole process will collapse."

I know the minister believes in the collective bargaining process; he's told us that on many occasions. We've said that we believe in that process, but what is happening through legislative acts such as this is that the process is not only being weakened; it is being very much harmed. What we're left with, at the end of the day, and I've heard this from trustees and I've heard this from teachers, is, "Then what is the importance of really going through that whole process and negotiating when in point of fact we might as well just go to a stalemate and see how far we can just outwait the minister?"

I hope the minister will recognize that in having to bring in these three pieces of legislation what we are admitting collectively is failure, that we have not been able, in a meaningful way, to resolve these disputes. I think as well I would say to trustees and to teachers' representatives to think very long and hard as other negotiations are entered into around coming to an agreement in order, as well, to protect that collective bargaining process. Again this is an admission of failure. I don't think anybody can feel good or proud to have to bring this legislation before the House.

I would simply join with the minister in saying that I urge the two parties to sit down and try to work this out, indeed to work it out before Christmas so that the best Christmas present to the young people in the city of Windsor would be -- they might not want to admit this -- and certainly for their parents, to be back in school on January 3. I think we just have to really focus on it.

But minister, your government, the expenditure controls and the social contract have played and continue to play havoc with the whole collective bargaining process in this province. I think you've got to recognize that and, as I say, work hard over the break to make sure that we don't have to face this kind of legislation again.

The Acting Speaker: Questions or comments?

Mr James J. Bradley (St Catharines): In the two minutes that I have available, I would like to compliment the member on his speech and recall, as perhaps he wanted to -- he wanted to take a little longer time -- all of the people who would be concerned about yet another strikebreaking bill being brought in by an NDP government, a government that consists of many people who have served so very well in years gone by on labour councils across the province.

I sat on platforms with them and I have gone to the various union halls to see my good friends, and never once have I heard that the NDP government was going to break strikes, was going to bring in back-to-work legislation, even though I had seen it take place in other provinces, in Saskatchewan, for instance, where the NDP government sent the nurses back to work before they went on strike because there was a provincial election coming up in that province, and in Manitoba and British Columbia similar action has been taken.

I never expected it in Ontario, where so many of our good friends on the government side have served as members of labour councils, and they will probably have an explanation when they go back to the labour council and indicate that they have voted for a strikebreaking bill.

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I know that my good friend Malcolm Buchanan of OSSTF, a good New Democrat, will be very concerned about this bill. Liz Barkley, the president of OSSTF, will say, "We don't have, I hope, another strikebreaking bill." Menno Vorster, a strong supporter of the NDP in years gone by, and Rod Albert, another very good friend of mine who could never have contemplated an NDP government ever bringing in legislation of this kind. Gill Sandeman, a strong New Democrat over the years, would be surprised to hear that yet another bill is being brought in to break a teachers' strike. I know Jim Head is concerned when he sees this happening; he's been a very good person, and even Larry French was walking around the halls today and he must be just shaking in his boots and tearing up his NDP card.

Mr Gregory S. Sorbara (York Centre): I want to compliment my friend and neighbour the member for York North on this bill and the point that he made, which was that this represents a failure in the system and part of that failure goes right back to the social contract.

But I want to tell you why I would and will vote against this bill when it comes up for a vote and for third reading: The minister said when he introduced the bill that he is bringing in this bill now because the Legislature intends to rise. Well, certainly it does intend to rise this evening or perhaps tomorrow, but the whole point of this exercise is the way in which we deal with strikes. By the way, I don't object to this bill because it brings an end to the strike. What I object to is that the government is trying to avoid the political liability that generally comes to a government when it must recall a Legislature to end a strike.

The fact is that in order to avoid the political liability and recall Parliament to bring an end to the strike, the minister does it now in a very antiseptic way and says that it will only be proclaimed in the event that the Education Relations Commission proclaims jeopardy. I say to him, why not then bring in an omnibus bill? Just do it once and for all. Avoid the political liability from here on in; that is to say, bring in one bill and from now on the Legislature will not have to be bothered with intervening and bringing an end to the strike.

This government, which believed in democratic rights and the authority of Parliament has, with every passing session of this Parliament, removed more and more the authority of Parliament to actively participate in the ongoing problems of this province and has tried to insulate itself from the political liability and the damage it has done. I think that's objectionable and therefore will vote against this bill.

The Acting Speaker: Further questions and comments? The member for London North.

Mrs Dianne Cunningham (London North): I'll just speak briefly to the government's strikebreaking legislation this afternoon.

The Acting Speaker: These are questions and comments. Further questions or comments? If not, the member for York North has two minutes in response.

Mr Beer: I have set out my arguments. I want to thank my colleagues the members for St Catharines and York Centre, who I think have added useful comments, and just say to the minister that in our view this is a recognition of failure and we've just got to do a much better job.

The Acting Speaker: Before I ask for further debate, we want to wish our pages very well on their way back to all parts of Ontario. Thank you for serving us really well. Have a good Christmas and success in your school year.

Mrs Cunningham: On that point, Mr Speaker, I think that what's this Legislative Assembly and province are all about, the young people. I guess I would say to the minister today that in spite of my brief comment with regard to the strikebreaking legislation, I think it's important that we recognize today that this bill accomplishes something very important, and that is that young people will be back in school where they ought to be.

If we have a difficulty in the collective bargaining process in this province, it isn't news to the minister or the former minister that we should have looked at Bill 100, the collective bargaining act. It has certainly been brought to our attention for the last five or six years that a piece of legislation that has been on the books with minimal change over a period of some 20 years deserves some scrutiny. There are parts of that legislation which are now being brought into effect that never have been before by school boards and may have been avoided if we had an opportunity to update that particular piece of legislation.

I think that we know, when it comes to this piece of legislation, that the Education Relations Commission is going to have an extremely important role to play and that is to advise the government as to when the students' school year may be in jeopardy. I hope they take into consideration that for some of the young people in our elementary schools in this province, every day counts. There is the precedent of the government in the east Parry Sound elementary panel, which is a precedent for them in legislating back-to-work; those students were out for 40 instructional days, which is too long. These students have been out for some 27 instructional days. This legislation will allow them to be out for, in my recognition, another 13 before anything happens anyway.

I would say that the Education Relations Commission has an extremely responsible position in this strike right now and should be seriously thinking about every single elementary school student in Windsor who, if it isn't important for them to be in school every single day, we have to wonder what that legislation, Bill 100, and the role of the Education Relations Commission are all about. I hope they are listening very carefully to the concerns as expressed here this afternoon as we represent the public.

I think that the minister was put in a bit of a predicament in his own riding. In fact, he had to bring forth the legislation today, given that it is the last scheduled day of the House, and it has forced the minister to take some action. He, in the legislation, has accomplished a time frame that will allow this bill to go into place in an effective way if those who are advising him take this seriously.

We have to say to ourselves, why in the province of Ontario at this time are we experiencing more strikes at any one time since this legislation was brought in 1975.

Hon Mr Cooke: It isn't true.

Mrs Cunningham: The minister is saying that's not so. That's his problem. I have to say right now that across this province there have never been so many school boards that are in this situation, thinking of going on strike, thinking of work stoppages. I'm saying we have never had this many strikes at one time since 1975, when Bill 100 became law.

Hon Mr Cooke: That's wrong.

Mrs Cunningham: If it's wrong, challenge it and show me otherwise. That's certainly what we did; we looked into that and that's my understanding and I have not been proven wrong.

Hon Mr Cooke: I did; I showed you in estimates.

Mrs Cunningham: Oh, it was stated in estimates, but never proven in estimates. There's a difference.

I just have to say also that with regard to the reasons in Ontario for strikes such as this, I'm just going to go back to what the minister himself said when he introduced the bill. He made his own editorial comments separate from the statement that accompanied the legislation, which I very much appreciated because it helps all of us in understanding what it's about.

But he made it very clear that this board was in difficulty and made decisions before the expenditure control plan and before the social contract discussions; it had made drastic reductions. I think that's an editorial comment on behalf of the minister and he left the impression that he didn't approve of that. Now again, if he does approve of it, he'll have an opportunity to answer that question if anybody wants to ask him.

But I will say this: School boards, at least so far and to this date, have the responsibility to represent their citizens. It's up to them to talk about their appropriate levels of budget. Perhaps they themselves saw the difficulties within their own boards, unlike many boards across this province that are running in debt; unprecedented in the province of Ontario, they're running up debts.

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Hon Mr Cooke: You are wrong again.

Mrs Cunningham: No, I'm not. The separate school boards in this province have run up unprecedented debts in the last five years. We've had to call in a commission to look at one of the school board debts in the Premier's own riding. It's unheard of. We've never asked for one of those before. Whether we like it or not, it's a situation that we all have to face, that the public is demanding that local municipal governments, school boards and this provincial government manage their accounts and the public's money wisely.

In fact, we do have deficits and debts and we have to make plans for getting rid of them. Not only that; the young people are not going to continue paying all these taxes. Neither are the business people. That's what this school board's responsibilities are all about.

If the minister was saying he thought they were making drastic reductions prior to the expenditure control plan, maybe they had a vision or a sense of responsibility. Prior to the social contract, maybe they had, again, a vision or responsibility. We stand in this House today and I will say it loudly and clearly: The expenditure control plan got in the way of collective bargaining in this province. It upset the whole collective bargaining process.

I can tell this House that the teachers I've spoken to right across this province would have preferred an across-the-board cut, if in fact that's what it took, to what they've been left with: young people who cannot move across the grid for three years, the lowest-paid teachers, those least able to support this system in Ontario with their tax dollars because they don't earn a wonderful living. Those at the top can sustain this kind of challenge when it comes to paying taxes in these difficult times.

The expenditure control plan got in the way of collective bargaining, mucked it all up, and this government, which stands for the collective bargaining and for people whom it thinks we don't represent, has done the very thing it never would have let us get away with.

So today I have to say, the bad news is that they're going to have more strikes until they get that expenditure control plan and that social contract in line, and have discussions as to how it's affecting the collective bargaining process and the teachers and school boards across this province. They're going to have to consult for a change with all school boards and teacher groups to find out what's wrong and why we are confronting all these new strikes across the province and these pending strikes.

Secondly, I just have to say today that we will be supporting the legislation because we think young people should be in school, and for that I commend the minister.

The Acting Speaker: Questions or comments?

Mr Sorbara: I understand the point of view of my friend the member for London North. I just want to reiterate once again that the government has the authority, when the Education Relations Commission declares jeopardy, to bring forward a bill in this Parliament to end a strike. That's something that we've seen on many, many occasions. But what I want to say to the Education minister is that he has to take the political liability of recalling Parliament to do that at that time. This antiseptic approach whereby he brings a bill in because he wants to recess tomorrow and go away on what he thinks, I guess, is a well-deserved holiday, just won't fly.

The cost of ending a strike is the political liability of recalling the Parliament and having the Legislature consider back-to-work legislation, a strikebreaking bill. But instead of doing that he has said to us, "We want to recess tomorrow so we'll pass this bill just in case so that in the secrecy of cabinet we can decide when we want to bring this strike to an end." That, frankly, is inappropriate. He's trying to avoid the political liability that comes with this sort of strikebreaking bill. He's done this during the time that he was government House leader, restricting the rules and the authority of this Parliament to consider public business, and this is yet another step.

If he wants to do that, why not just bring forward a bill saying teachers' strikes are illegal henceforth, or an omnibus power to say, "We will do it by cabinet decision," because here everything else is done by cabinet decision. This is a dishonest bill. He should encounter the political liability of having to recall Parliament, bring us back here if and when he wanted to end this strike and not give himself the power just in case he needs it down the road.

The Acting Speaker: Further questions or comments?

The member for London North has two minutes in response. There is no response.

Further debate? Seeing none, does the Minister of Education have some closing remarks?

Hon Mr Cooke: No, Mr Speaker. I appreciate the participation in the debate.

The Acting Speaker: Mr Cooke has moved second reading of Bill 139. Is it the pleasure of the House that the motion carry?

All those in favour, please say "aye."

All those in favour, please say "nay."

In my opinions, the ayes have it.

Shall the bill be ordered for third reading?

Hon Brian A. Charlton (Government House Leader): Mr Speaker, I think we probably need consent to proceed with third reading.

The Acting Speaker: Do we have unanimous consent to proceed with third reading? Agreed.

Hon Mr Cooke: I move third reading of Bill 139.

The Acting Speaker: Further debate? No debate?

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

All those in favour, please say "aye."

All those opposed, please say "nay."

In my opinion, the ayes have it. I declare the motion carried.

Resolved that the bill do now pass and be entitled as in the motion.

TEACHERS' PENSION AMENDMENT ACT, 1993 / LOI DE 1993 MODIFIANT LA LOI SUR LE RÉGIME DE RETRAITE DES ENSEIGNANTS

The following bill was given third reading on motion:

Bill 121, An Act to amend the Teachers' Pension Act / Projet de loi 121, Loi modifiant la Loi sur le régime de retraite des enseignants.

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Hon Brian A. Charlton (Government House Leader): Mr Speaker, we're now going to move to the Pr bills, orders 111, 112 and 113. I think we need consent to do them on second and third reading.

The Acting Speaker: Do we have unanimous consent to deal with second and third reading? Agreed.

ALL-WOOD LAND CLEARING LTD ACT, 1993

On motion by Ms Murdock, the following bill was given second reading:

Bill Pr67, An Act to revive All-Wood Clearing Ltd.

The bill was also given third reading on motion.

GROUPE CONCORDE INC. ACT, 1993

On motion by Mr Harris, the following bill was given second reading:

Bill Pr68, An Act to revive Le Groupe Concorde Inc.

The bill was also given third reading on motion.

UKRAINIAN PEOPLE'S HOME IN PRESTON ACT, 1993

On motion by Mr Cooper, the following bill was given second reading:

Bill Pr73, An Act to revive Ukrainian People's Home in Preston.

The bill was also given third reading on motion.

The Acting Speaker (Mr Noble Villeneuve): Orders of the day, government House leader.

Hon Brian A. Charlton (Government House Leader): The 82nd order, Mr Speaker. I understand that because this is a private member's bill we'll need consent to deal with second reading in this setting and then we'll also need consent to deal with third reading.

The Acting Speaker: Do we have consent for second and third reading? Do we have unanimous consent? Agreed.

REPRESENTATION AMENDMENT ACT, 1993 / LOI DE 1993 MODIFIANT LA LOI SUR LA REPRÉSENTATION ÉLECTORALE

Mr Beer moved second reading of the following bill:

Bill 33, An Act to amend the Representation Act / Projet de loi 33, Loi modifiant la Loi sur la représentation électorale.

The Acting Speaker (Mr Noble Villeneuve): Does the member have some opening remarks?

Mr Charles Beer (York North): Very briefly, first of all I want to thank all members for allowing this private member's bill to come forward and hopefully to be passed today.

York-Mackenzie, the new name I am proposing for York North provincial riding, reflects our area's historic connection to the very roots of responsible government in Canada and commemorates three of its most notable political figures.

William Lyon Mackenzie found staunch support in our area from the beginning of his political career in 1828 until his failed rebellion in 1837. His grandson, William Lyon Mackenzie King, the Prime Minister, sat for the federal North York riding from 1921 to 1925, and Major A.A. (Lex) Mackenzie's distinguished political career as York North's representative in the Ontario Legislature stretched from 1945 to 1967.

The name York North was bestowed on our area by the Representation Act of Upper Canada, 1859, for purely geographic reasons. York county was divided at that time into three ridings: north, east and west. As with so many things in our shrinking and overly complex world, the simple geographic designation is today making life confusing for voters, civil servants, the post office and even elected representatives.

The old name is often confused with that of the city of North York, the federal riding of York North, the north of the region of York and other York provincial ridings. Equally important, we are no longer the region of York's most northerly riding. Today our northern boundary is the line separating Newmarket and East Gwillimbury.

Now is the appropriate time to give our riding a distinctive name, and I believe that York-Mackenzie reflects our long and distinguished political history and the important role this riding has played in our province's and our nation's affairs from the very earliest days of the colonial period.

Again, I want to thank all members and urge the passage of this private member's bill.

Mr Gregory S. Sorbara (York Centre): Very briefly, I just want to congratulate my friend from York North. When I was first elected in this Legislature in 1985, I represented the riding of York North and it was, as he said, often confused with North York and a whole bunch of other things.

We are very, very saddened to see the departure of the member for York North, and I want to be the first to welcome, as soon as this bill passes, the member for York-Mackenzie, one of the most distinguished members of this Legislature, congratulate him on his great work here and the fact that he has given new and even better recognition to a great riding, well represented certainly for the past eight and a half years.

The Acting Speaker (Ms Margaret H. Harrington): Any questions or comments to the member? Seeing none, any further speakers?

Does the member for York North have any further comments? Seeing none, is it the pleasure of the House that the motion carry? Carried.

Shall the bill be ordered for third reading? Agreed.

Mr Beer: I move third reading, Madam Speaker.

The Acting Speaker: Do you wish to make some comments?

Further debate? Seeing none, is it the pleasure of the House that the motion carry? I resolve that the bill do now pass and be entitled as in the motion.

ENVIRONMENTAL BILL OF RIGHTS, 1993 / CHARTE DES DROITS ENVIRONNEMENTAUX DE 1993

Mr Wildman moved third reading of Bill 26, An Act respecting Environmental Rights in Ontario / Projet de loi 26, Loi concernant les droits environnementaux en Ontario.

The Acting Speaker (Ms Margaret H. Harrington): Minister, would you like to comment?

Hon Bud Wildman (Minister of Environment and Energy): Very briefly, I understand that there has been an agreement and I won't take much time. If you would indulge me for a moment, I would like, on a personal note, on behalf of my family, to express thanks to all of the members of the assembly who have been so kind to me and my family over the last few weeks.

Having said that, I want to thank the members who have worked on the committee and have facilitated the passage of the Environmental Bill of Rights and also to thank the members of my staff who, in my absence, along with my parliamentary assistant, were so active in the committee work along with the other members of the committee.

The Environmental Bill of Rights contains a number of innovative features: It will establish an electronic registry; it will give people proper notification and allow them to get involved at a very early stage of the decision-making process; 14 ministries of the government will establish statements of environmental values, and these statements will be placed on the registry; the statements will create a new environmental ethic for the provincial government as a whole; an Environmental Commissioner will be appointed to serve as a watchdog of government activities and report to the Legislature; and individual members of the public will have expanded rights to act on behalf of the environment.

Rights to request reviews of acts, policies, regulations and instruments will be provided to members of the public, and members of the public will have the right to initiate investigation into our environmental laws if they believe environmental laws have been broken. There will be increased access to the courts to protect the environment.

One area I do regret is that, although we all worked very hard, both in the Ministry of Environment and Energy and with the Chiefs of Ontario and the chiefs of the first nations and in the committee, we were unable to reach an agreement on amendments that would provide protection for treaty and aboriginal rights in specific amendments to the bill, so those negotiations were not finalized and the amendments did not proceed. We anticipate there will be a continuing dialogue with the Chiefs of Ontario to ensure that aboriginal and treaty rights can be protected while ensuring greater access and protection for the environment.

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This is a tremendous step forward. It's really a bill that is a victory for all Ontarians in terms of environmental protection and involving the public in environmental decision-making, and I commend third reading to all members of the Legislature.

The Acting Speaker: Any questions or comments to the minister? Seeing none, further debate?

Mr Steven Offer (Mississauga North): I'm pleased to rise and debate on this particular piece of legislation, to which we are not opposed. I would like, in the very short period of time permitted in terms of debate on this bill, to indicate that the bill came about as a result of a task force of individuals who represent a variety of interests across the province. As a result of that task force, a certain consensus was achieved on a variety of areas and those particular areas found their way into the piece of legislation. For that, I think the task force is to be congratulated and commended for the work it has done.

When it got into legislative form, the bill, I must say in as balanced a way as I can, went through a very curious process. I believe the bill, which is a very complicated piece of legislation and touches on very many intricate and complicated areas, should have received -- and I will always say this -- more public input and more of an inclusive public hearing process. The bill in its final form could have and should have received an even greater degree of input from the general public on a piece of legislation which has tremendous potential in terms of its impact and protection of the environment. But for some reason the government did not want to allow that type of public participation, and notwithstanding the great success of the task force and my support of the bill, the bill will always carry with it a little concern on my part in that we did not reach out, and it was not possible because of the particular process dictated to us, to really get as much public input as we otherwise could.

Certainly I think that in the time we did have allocated to us there were some very important statements made by those who were able to take part in the public hearing process. There were important statements made by them through their presentations and there were also very important statements made, and I speak to the Minister of Environment, by your parliamentary assistant and ministry staff. I think those statements that are now part of Hansard and part of the committee recordings will be very important to many people who will want some further guidance as to how this particular piece of legislation is to operate, the breadth and scope of the legislation. We recognize very much the difficulty in the procedure of the bill, but I think there were still some very important statements made by the parliamentary assistant and by the ministry staff which I think and hope will go some way to dealing with some of the confusion over some areas that existed and I hope were attempted to be resolved.

One of the things I'm particularly pleased about is that our party had a concern that the piece of legislation might foist on the municipalities a financial obligation in a number of areas. It was on that basis that I, on behalf of my party, put forward an amendment that this bill would not provide any financial burden on any municipality. The government accepted that particular amendment and it now forms part of the legislation. I believe it will go some way to calming some of the fears municipalities had in terms of the workings of the legislation.

Finally, there was a further amendment we provided which received some fine-tuning which actually in some way increased the scope of the work of the Environmental Commissioner. I think that adds a little bit more to the role and function of the Environmental Commissioner.

I think, however, that there is an expectation of the general public as to what an Environmental Bill of Rights is. They come with a certain expectation, and I think that when they take a look at the piece of legislation, it might not meet the expectation that an Environmental Bill of Rights has in the general minds of the public. It deals in some very important areas, but I think there is an expectation of new rights, of a new process that the general public can avail themselves of in terms of the protection of the environment. I do not believe this particular bill meets all of those expectations. I think that when the general public has the opportunity to take a look at the piece of legislation, when they understand the process that they are going to have to go through and they take a look at the roles and the functions of the Environmental Commissioner, they may have some questions as to how this bill actually does meet their particular needs in the vast regions of this province.

However, I do realize that we are under, and it has become the case in this particular piece of legislation, some significant time constraints, so I will complete my remarks by indicating our support for the legislation and indicating that I believe the amendment we move which protects municipalities from the costs of this legislation in its implementation is one which I think many will support.

Mr Gregory S. Sorbara (York Centre): While I appreciate the comments of my colleague from Mississauga North, I am not going to be supporting this bill. I'm going to be voting against it. I want to tell my friend the Minister of Environment why.

Although the principles in the bill are ones that I would adhere to, the -- I'm sorry to use this word -- hypocrisy of presenting this bill at the same time as the government has arbitrarily and without any investigation made a private cabinet determination under Bill 143 that all of Metropolitan Toronto's garbage shall be dumped in York region is the epitome of violating in one piece of legislation --

Mr Jim Wiseman (Durham West): On a point of order, Madam Speaker: The use of that word, "hypocrisy," in this Legislature has been confirmed on more than one occasion by Deputy Speaker Morin as not an acceptable use of the language, and I believe the member should withdraw that. If he doesn't want to defend his residents and support --

The Acting Speaker: Thank you very much. To the member for York Centre, I would prefer that you not use that. Would you withdraw, please.

Mr Sorbara: Madam Speaker, I described the legislation as a piece of hypocrisy, no individual member --

The Acting Speaker: I have asked --

Mr Sorbara: -- but I'll withdraw that as well.

Just let me point out another inconsistency, not to say hypocrisy. During the constitutional debates, Bob Rae went around this province crying out for a social charter. We had to have a social charter which guaranteed the rights of workers to organize and bargain collectively. But in doing his business in Ontario, he gave us not a social charter but a social contract which violated the rights of one million workers in the public sector and the broader public sector.

Similarly, in York region the government has used its power and authority to require that York region be required to accept all of Metro's garbage. During the same Parliament, during the same session, to say, "We believe in an Environmental Bill of Rights," is in my view hypocritical.

Mr Wiseman: I just want to make a very short comment on the Environmental Bill of Rights with respect to landfill sites. This section of this bill is very important in that it allows the residents to put forward a challenge to the ministry and ask it to review certificates of approval, laws that are in place, regulations that are in place. In my constituency, of course, with Brock West being the mess that it is, it will allow the residents there to challenge and to ask the minister to review the situation and to put forward arguments as to why he or she should. This is the same kind of protection that would be afforded to the residents of Vaughan and will be the same protection that will be afforded to the residents of Peel.

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I believe the Environmental Bill of Rights is an extremely important piece of protection which would allow any two residents within that community to ask for a review and to ask that the ministry account for what it's doing. To do otherwise simply allows, as the opposition parties were trying to do with their amendment, waste management issues to not even be included, and I think that would be wrong.

It's unfortunate that the member for York Centre will not be supporting the bill. I think he's letting his constituents down. I think this is an excellent bill and will be supporting it, and I hope my residents and my constituents will use it to the best effect possible.

The Acting Speaker: Further questions or comments? Seeing none, the member for Mississauga North has two minutes to respond if he wishes.

Mr Offer: No, thank you.

The Acting Speaker: Further debate?

Mr David Tilson (Dufferin-Peel): I have agreed to limit my remarks with respect to this bill, as has the Liberal critic.

Mr James J. Bradley (St Catharines): Instead of our allotted hour and a half.

Mr Tilson: I wish we did, and I must say it's an interesting experience as we watch bills flip through this evening at a rapid pace in the same way this process with respect to the whole process of the Environmental Bill of Rights, in my view, has gone through at a rather rapid pace.

I know the Minister of Environment will tell me about the task force that was developed, and we in the opposition have congratulated him for that, in fact the former Minister of the Environment as well, with respect to a process that went through with the environmental interest groups and members of business. Of course, that was done, in my view, with the threat of a bill such as Bill 12 when the NDP was in opposition putting forward an environmental bill at that stage, which I must say frightened many of the people in the business community.

However, we now have a bill that was drafted by a group of business interest groups, environmental interest groups, a wide range, and I do say that the government needs to be congratulated on that, although there were a number of groups that were excluded from that process. It's been quite clear that the farmers have expressed a concern that they didn't have adequate say in the process that followed with the development of that bill, nor did developers, nor did home builders, nor did renovators, nor did the construction industry. There was a large number of groups that were excluded from that process.

That leads us up to this whole process of a bill that was introduced in May of this year. Nothing really happened until this fall. The public hearings were limited. We really had an inadequate time to hear delegations. The time frame was shortened. There was an inadequate time for dialogue with the delegations that came forward. Many of the delegations were approached on very short notice and didn't even have time to submit written submissions. In fact, in many cases we have yet to receive those. I will say that has distressed me in terms of the process of reaching where we are now in trying to put forward a very complicated bill which has, I believe, 126 sections and many, many complicated areas throughout those 126 sections. So it has been a rather speedy process. There was not even any advertisement undertaken with respect to delegation, so that the people of Ontario weren't even informed that this process was going on.

The whole process with respect to clause-by-clause was restricted to two days: two days to develop and debate the various amendments that were put forward by the Liberal Party, the Progressive Conservative Party and the government, and the actual 126 clauses. So I will say I object to the process that has come forward. I don't think sufficient time has been put forward with respect to this bill.

There were some excellent presentations given to the committee. Many of you who have been on that committee, I am sure, have those reports: Laidlaw Waste Systems, the Ontario Waste Management Association, the Ontario Forest Industries Association, AMO and the Ontario Farm Environmental Coalition, to name some that made excellent presentations.

The agricultural community is certainly concerned that the Farm Practices Protection Act will not go far enough to protect the farmer from this legislation, from perhaps the environmental extremists. I hate to use that word, but there are people the farmer fears who could cause problems to the agricultural community. Certainly that group has expressed grave concerns that this bill is going to create more problems for an already suffering agricultural community.

AMO was perhaps the most attacking of all of the presenters. They expressed the uncertainty about instruments and other pieces of legislation. They expressed concerns about the appeal process, the issue of delegated authority and, more important, the cost, notwithstanding the amendment that was made at the committee hearings, to municipalities, the cost to people who are making application.

The Ontario Forest Industries Association was concerned, as a number of organizations were concerned, about the potential duplication, and that was expressed by many delegations. The Ontario Waste Management Association expressed concerns that the designated ministries should be developing statements of environmental values in the draft process prior to this bill being passed so that this House and the committee could study exactly what those statements of environmental values are. We didn't really have an opportunity to get into that.

Throughout, there was a concern about the ministry's discretion, that it may not be used appropriately, and that was argued by all members of this House. It's fine if you have a responsible minister, but if you don't have a responsible minister, the minister could exercise his or her discretion in an inappropriate way.

Laidlaw Waste Systems was concerned about the approval process, that it could be unpredictable and costly in an already unpredictable and costly process. They felt there was already a process and way that would solve many of the concerns, and that this really means more delay, more cost and again more unpredictability.

I will honour my undertaking to be brief in my comments to emphasize my concern about the process. I have the feeling, as the critic for the Progressive Conservative Party, that this whole process has been rammed through, that the people of Ontario, notwithstanding the work done by the task force -- and I emphasize that I do congratulate the minister on that. But the work of the committee, the work of this House has been shortened for a very complicated and important bill, so much that even when I look at periodicals that have come out, the Index to Services for the government of Ontario, it's already been printed.

The Environmental Bill of Rights office has opened up and has a staff of already a large number of people, and this is before the bill is even passed, which states that, "The purpose of the Environmental Bill of Rights office is to establish and implement procedures to enable the ministry to fulfil its obligations under the Environmental Bill of Rights, facilitate the government-wide implementation of the bill, establish the office of the Environmental Commissioner, render operational a publicly accessible electronic registry and make provisions for the training of ministry staff." Very strange to put in a government periodical when the bill hasn't even been passed.

The Acting Speaker: Questions or comments to the member for Dufferin-Peel? Seeing none, is there any further debate?

Mr Bradley: I too will begin by saying that I regret I will not have very much time to speak this evening. I find the end-of-session procedures to be contrary to everything I believe about parliamentary procedure; nevertheless, I'm one member out of 130, and I suppose everybody here is bound and determined that we must wrap up tonight instead of evaluating these bills and debating them in some detailed form. I find it unseemly that we are rushing through a number of bills this evening and that they're not getting the kind of scrutiny and discussion they should. But, as I say, as one of 130 -- there may be more -- I guess that's the way the ball bounces.

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I want to indicate from the beginning with this bill -- because I've followed it with some interest over the years. A similar bill was introduced by Stuart Smith in the 1970s, 1980s, and subsequently by Murray Elston when he was the critic for the Liberal opposition and there was an excellent bill, a very tough bill, introduced by Ruth Grier, the member for Etobicoke-Lakeshore.

I want to indicate to this House that this bill in no way resembles the bill that was introduced by Ruth Grier to this House and that it is a significantly watered-down bill. That may be the way that it has to be in order to receive the acquiescent nod of the business community in this province. We know the Premier is eager to gain some favour with the business community and not annoy it any more than he has now.

Therefore, we have a significantly different bill. What is unfortunate is that the report of this will be that the government has passed some significant piece of legislation. I hope I don't read in the Globe and Mail or listen to the CBC and find this out or read some publication put out by a hard-hitting environmental group that somehow this is a major departure towards progress in the field of the environment, because it's far from it.

However, my hopes are not high that that in fact will be the case. I'm sure the government will extol the virtues of this bill as a prerogative of the government. But those who really know the story of this bill, if they can in all good conscience say that this bill is a bill they would have accepted from a Liberal or a Conservative government, boy, I would be very surprised at that.

I expressed concern previously, and I will again, that the resources of the Ministry of Environment are limited at this time and it is my view that the priorities of this government, which I think in terms of dealing with those issues -- I may just add 15 minutes after that. When I get the smirks from the government henchmen on the sidelines, it makes me want to continue on just a little, so the smirk will get you another 15 minutes.

Anyway, I expressed great concern about the fact that the resources of the ministry are going to be skewed by the demands of individuals who will take advantage of this bill. That's what the bill invites, and if the ministry has a lot of resources, if the money, the staff and the actual equipment that the ministry has is increasing considerably, the government can then sustain those from outside who would indicate what the government should be doing as opposed to what the minister and members of the civil service indicate may be important.

I don't think those resources are there. I think there's a suggestion in this bill, and it certainly flows quickly from this bill, that in fact there's going to be a need for considerable more resources, and those resources are simply not there.

I commend to members of the House -- I won't quote from it because I don't want to be overly long tonight -- a speech made by Dianne Saxe, formerly of the Ministry of the Environment, a well-known environmental lawyer. She has a rather interesting critique on some of the implications of this bill. I simply commend it to members of the House so that they can see that the implications of this bill are rather far-reaching. They might have been canvassed if there had been something more extensive in the way of public input and public hearings.

I also read from a document which indicates the business community doesn't have to be too afraid of this, previously put out by a firm which advises companies about government legislation. The document said: "Don't be afraid of this bill. You should not, as a company, be concerned about its implications for you." There are different views that will come out on this, but this was a newsletter that went out to many companies, so they certainly don't have to be concerned.

I make a plea to the government. I know the minister's listened carefully to this. In fact, I think he has, to his credit, to my knowledge at least, maintained the investigations and enforcement branch as a strong and independent branch. I have been concerned that his colleagues in government, who naturally want to see the ministry trimmed as much as possible in light of the financial circumstances, would want to perhaps remove the independence of the investigation and enforcement branch by putting it together with other branches which are abatement and other services and put them under the control of regional directors. I think the independence of the investigation and enforcement branch is exceedingly important to preserve. It's my understanding that the minister is certainly supportive of that and I hope that is borne out by what happens.

So much has to be done to meet the environmental expectations and needs of the people of this province. This is one of the steps, but I hope that there will not be a collective sigh of relief from government members and the community at large; that somehow, now that we have this Environmental Bill of Rights, so-called, we don't have to worry about all the environmental challenges that are out there.

One thing the next government will be able to say when it comes into office is that the government, for whatever reason -- and I understand the state of the economy, to be very fair -- has not set an exceedingly high benchmark in terms of what may be expected from a subsequent government. Unfortunately, if those who have been acquiescent and quiet during these debates and during the last three years and a couple of months dare to criticize a subsequent government, the credibility will simply not allow them to do so with any degree of success.

I'm with the minister here. I wish him the very best of luck in the implementation of this bill. I encourage his colleagues to provide for him the resources he's going to need to carry out his responsibilities. The member for Algoma is a strong supporter of the environment, has been since his election to this House in 1975, and deserves the strong support of his colleagues in the cabinet particularly but in the government caucus, and certainly he may be counted upon for my support in any initiatives he brings forward which will be of benefit to the environment.

The Acting Speaker: Questions or comments? Any further speakers? Seeing none, the minister.

Hon Mr Wildman: I'd like to just close debate if there are no other members who wish to participate in the debate.

I want to thank the members for their comments and their concerns about the length of time. I do recognize that is a consideration we all must take into account as parliamentarians. I want to say, though, that this bill is indeed the result of a considerable consultative process. The task force work has been mentioned. There are a couple of members of the task force in the gallery this evening as well as a large number of staff members of the Ministry of Environment and Energy, who worked very hard on this piece of legislation. I would like, on behalf of all members of the House and of the government, to express our thanks to all of them for the work they have done.

This bill is a people-powered bill. The fact is that people, two individuals, can indeed initiate action that will review or investigate activities with regard to environmental protection and environmental instruments and the instruments of various ministries of the government as it relates to the environment.

What is remarkable about this bill is that it is based on the consensus that was reached by disparate groups represented in the task force. There were comments made about the presentations before the standing committee. I believe there were about 25 presentations, and the majority of those presentations were very supportive of this legislation.

While there was widespread support for the bill as drafted, there were some who appeared before the committee and said it went too far. There were others who said it didn't go far enough. This is indeed an attempt to reach a consensus by taking into account the concerns and interests of very widespread and different views throughout the society. It is, I think, a triumph for all Ontarians, and the challenge now is for all of us in government, environmental groups, in business and labour, to make it work.

The Acting Speaker: The Honourable Mr Wildman has moved third reading of Bill 26, An Act respecting Environmental Rights in Ontario. 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. I declare the motion carried.

Resolved that the bill do now pass and be entitled as in the motion.

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EDUCATION AMENDMENT ACT, 1993 / LOI DE 1993 MODIFIANT LA LOI SUR L'ÉDUCATION

Mr Martin, on behalf of Mr Cooke, moved third reading of Bill 125, An Act to amend the Education Act / Projet de loi 125, Loi modifiant la Loi sur l'éducation.

The Acting Speaker (Ms Margaret H. Harrington): Would the parliamentary assistant wish to make any remarks? No. Any debate?

Mr Charles Beer (York North): I'll be very brief, just to say to the parliamentary assistant, as I noted during second reading debate, that we are supporting this bill, particularly with respect to the proposals for the parents' council. That is an important initiative; it is important that it function well. I encourage the members of the council to look at how they can organize their work to get around the province and to meet with parental groups in the various parts of the province.

Since the bill came in and since it went through second reading, I've had more calls from parents in different parts of the province who indicated, "Let's make sure this isn't simply a Toronto-based council." We all recognize, with Queen's Park being in the heart of Metropolitan Toronto, that not through any machiavellian will but simply because we are all here, those outside can sense at times that the views beyond Metropolitan Toronto are not heard. I think this council can do some very good work and it is important that it travel.

The second thing I want to say is the importance for the council to reach out to those other major players who are also involved in our educational system, the trustees, organizations, the teacher organizations. What we're trying to do here is create a meaningful partnership where people really feel they are buying into helping to work on solutions. If that happens, I think that council can play an important and significant role in improving education in the province.

The Acting Speaker: Questions or comments? Further debate?

Mrs Dianne Cunningham (London North): Madam Speaker, I did put my comments on record. I'll just speak very briefly to underline one of the sections of this legislation that we agree with and three we have some concerns about.

The real concern I have this evening is with regard to process. Here we're facing a piece of legislation that the government refers to as omnibus, but I can only say that the issues within this legislation are so very different.

We're looking at local governance and talking about the numbers of school board trustees. We're looking at what I believe ought to be consultation, and parent involvement may be part of it, but in my view, something that deserves serious consideration and understanding by the citizens of this province is with regard to the kind of consultation process and the advisory committees, the number of advisory committees the minister now has access to. And then we're talking about two issues that perhaps rightfully belong together with regard to French-language governance.

On the first issue, it's very difficult for us to be able to come to some firm conclusion around whether we can support this legislation, because in fact we do agree that local school boards ought to be able to take the decision about whether they want to reduce the number of elected trustees who are there now. We know that the Etobicoke school board, the Metropolitan French-language school board, the Metropolitan Separate School Board in Toronto and Ottawa have all expressed an interest in reducing the number of trustees. We agree that they ought to have that kind of authority so we are in agreement with that kind of legislation. It's been a request, actually, from a number of school boards.

With regard to the Ontario Parent Council, the critics of the council are well versed in that they do understand that we're spending some $600,000 for parental input, a lot of which would be available at the local school board level, where I think the emphasis ought to be on parent councils, home and school associations, parent-teacher organizations and other parent groups, probably without cost if we were to take advantage of the individuals and interested parents around the province of Ontario who are just really crying out to be heard.

So I'm not sure that this vehicle is the best one for the government. It will be advisory group number 44 in the Ministry of Education and Training. That's right, 44 advisory groups in the Ministry of Education and Training still on the books; obviously, many of them are not active.

I will say, in terms of another piece of legislation we had to address this year -- I think it was called Bill 4; at any rate, it was with regard to the hard-to-serve students -- the ministry's own advisory committee on special education was not asked its opinion on that legislation. The minister has advisory committees and he should be asking their opinion. They came before a standing committee of this Legislative Assembly and advised us with regard to what I've just stated.

The minister has chosen to set up this committee; that's his prerogative to do so. We have no choice in this matter: We're outnumbered. It's another expensive vehicle.

I should not be concerned, because two London parents are there. I will congratulate Mr Richard Burke and of course Mr Richard Zelinka, the president of the Federation of Catholic Parent-Teacher Associations of Ontario and the chairperson of the Banting Home and School Association, respectively, on their appointments. We have no problems with the people who have been picked.

But we do have problems with the vehicle itself and problems with regard to the method this government has chosen in its selection of representatives for the parent council. It was announced on September 7 and applications were due on October 7 -- one month. Only six of the 18 seats on the parent council were filled from applications sent in by ordinary Ontario citizens.

So I'm speaking not in favour of that parent council at this point in time, but I think all of my caucus would agree that it will be established, the minister will be looking for its advice, and we certainly wish it the very best in the consultation process.

On the last two parts, continuing to establish French-language school boards by regulation, I have to say right up front that I am in favour, and so is my caucus, of minority-language rights. To us, this is a management issue, and we believe French-language school boards should be set up by acts of this Legislative Assembly as opposed to by regulations of the government of Ontario. We feel there ought to be public consultation and a real need shown and that it should be public debate; anything that's worth supporting is worth supporting by public debate in this regard.

I also would like to say with regard to the special election of minority-language boards between regular election years, part of the mandate of the royal commission is to advise the government in this regard, with regard to governance and other issues, and I think also with regard to parent involvement and communication. I can only say at this point that it's unnecessary; that the school boards are working right now, do have representation to their boards and are working quite well. I think, like every other school board, they can wait to be elected every three years. It just gets in the way of a clear, concise electoral process that would be consistent among public, separate and French-language school boards across the province of Ontario.

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I know one of my colleagues is wondering how we're going to vote. My caucus members will vote any way they choose to vote. I personally can only support one section of this legislation. I believe it ought to have been more bills we're looking at. I don't believe it should be rushed through before the Christmas break and, due to the process and the comments I've put on record on behalf of many of my colleagues, I will not be supporting this legislation.

The Acting Speaker: Questions or comments?

Mr Gregory S. Sorbara (York Centre): I've just been very impressed by the comments of my friend from London North. I think she's right about this bill and based on what she said, I am going to support her in opposition.

The Acting Speaker: Any further questions or comments?

Seeing none, the member for London North has two minutes to respond if she wishes. No?

Further debate? Seeing none, would the parliamentary assistant have any comments?

Mr Sorbara: He left.

The Acting Speaker: Thank you. Mr Martin, on behalf of Mr Cooke, has moved third reading of Bill 125, An Act to amend the Education Act.

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. I declare the motion carried.

Resolved that the bill do now pass and be entitled as in the motion.

CONCURRENCE IN SUPPLY

Resuming the adjourned debate on the motion for concurrence in supply for the following ministries and offices: Ministry of Agriculture and Food, Ministry of Housing, Ministry of Health, Ministry of Labour, office responsible for women's issues, Office of Francophone Affairs, Ministry of Education and Training, Ministry of Economic Development and Trade, Ministry of Community and Social Services, Ministry of Natural Resources, Ministry of Northern Development and Mines, and Ministry of Culture, Tourism and Recreation.

The Acting Speaker (Ms Margaret H. Harrington): Is there any further debate on this motion?

We shall go through each of the ministries separately for concurrence in supply.

Mrs Margaret Marland (Mississauga South): On a point of order, Madam Speaker: If there is unanimous consent, we're happy to vote on the concurrences for all the ministries with one vote.

The Acting Speaker: I am just going to confer with the clerk for a moment.

We will put each one separately.

Shall the estimates on the Ministry of Agriculture and Food be concurred with? Carried.

Shall the estimates for the Ministry of Housing be concurred with?

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.

I declare the motion carried.

Shall the estimates on the Ministry of Health be concurred with? Carried.

Shall the estimates on the Ministry of Labour be concurred with?

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.

I declare that motion carried.

Shall the estimates on the office responsible for women's issues be concurred with?

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

All those opposed will please say "nay."

In my opinion, the ayes have it. Carried.

Shall the estimates for the Office of Francophone Affairs be concurred with? Carried.

Shall the estimates on the Ministry of Education and Training be concurred with?

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. I declare the motion carried.

Shall the estimates for the Ministry of Economic Development and Trade be concurred with?

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. I declare the motion carried.

Shall the estimates on the Ministry of Community and Social Services be concurred with?

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. Carried.

Shall the estimates on the Ministry of Natural Resources be concurred with? Carried.

Shall the estimates on the Ministry of Northern Development and Mines be concurred with? Carried.

Shall the estimates for the Ministry of Culture, Tourism and Recreation be concurred with?

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. Carried.

Hon Marion Boyd (Attorney General and Minister Responsible for Women's Issues): I'd like to ask for unanimous consent to revert to the introduction of bills.

The Acting Speaker: Do we have unanimous consent? Agreed.

INTRODUCTION OF BILLS

SUPPLY ACT, 1993 / LOI DE CRÉDITS DE 1993

On motion by Mrs Boyd, on behalf of Mr Laughren, the following bill was given first reading:

Bill 140, An Act to authorize the payment of certain amounts for the Public Service for the fiscal year ending on the 31st day of March, 1994 / Projet de loi 140, Loi autorisant le paiement de certaines sommes destinées à la fonction publique pour l'exercice se terminant le 31 mars 1994.

Hon Marion Boyd (Attorney General and Minister Responsible for Women's Issues): In speaking to the supply bill, I ask that members follow the usual practice for this routine bill and agree to give it second and third reading today so that the legal confirmation of the estimates will be concluded before the House rises. The estimates debates have provided the members with the opportunity for debate on the expenditures that this bill authorizes, and it has accordingly been the practice of the House to concur in giving the supply bill all three readings on the same day.

So, if the House pleases, I now move second reading of the bill.

The Acting Speaker (Ms Margaret H. Harrington): Would you care to make any further remarks? Further debate?

Mr James J. Bradley (St Catharines): Thank you very much for once again providing some opportunity this evening to deal with a few issues that are, in my view, important to the Legislature. I wish we were dealing with these for yet another week, but we aren't, or that the House were back in January to deal with some of these issues, but I suspect it will not be back till at least March. If we follow the practice of other years, the government will delay further and come back some time in April and then, in June of the year, complain that it doesn't have enough time to deal with the agenda it has for us.

1910

I want to touch on a couple of issues of importance to me personally. There's not going to be unanimous agreement on this. Perhaps you and I, Madam Speaker, may not even agree on some of the issues that have come forward.

The first I'm going to deal with is the whole issue of gambling in this province and how I think it's getting very much out of control. There will be people, I guess, who would advance the argument that those who do not accept this are simply not accepting reality in Ontario. That's a pretty compelling argument. You can make that argument with a lot of issues of this kind, that one simply has to keep up with the times. I suspect, however, we as a society -- and I have expressed in the past my surprise and disappointment that it is an NDP government which has permitted this. But I think as a society, if I can put it in those terms, we are making a mistake moving further and further with opportunities to have people gamble their money away.

The latest that we have is offtrack betting, and I know a lot of people who are quite happy to see offtrack betting. They can now flock to their local bar or tavern and put their money down and bet on the horses. They don't even have to go to the racetrack now to watch the horses race. They can simply go to the particular establishment that somehow has been able to get the rights to run this.

What I would invite members to do is to go and observe it happening. Go and see who's gambling. Go and see what's happening in these establishments. I don't know if you'd be as eager if you watched what happens in those circumstances, just as I don't know if you'd be as eager when you watched some of the casinos that we're going to see established and the people who are going to be flocking to those casinos to gamble.

Niagara Falls, Ontario, where you're from, Madam Speaker, has expressed an interest in having a casino located there. I was buying my newspapers on the weekend. I don't ordinarily buy American newspapers except for sports, but I noticed the headline in the Niagara Falls Gazette mention a casino for Niagara Falls, New York. What it points out is exactly what I've been saying in this House: that you're not going to be the only game in town. As soon as somebody on the other side has one -- and Americans always have more money and seem to do things in a flashier way than we Canadians. As soon as you have one in Canada or a suggestion that you might have one in Canada, you'll have one immediately across the border competing with it and you'll have all of the problems that are associated with casino gambling without the benefits.

As I mentioned before, it's not easy to undo a lot of these things. If you think that a new government comes into power, a different party which has members who have strongly held views on these matters, and is going to be able to dismantle the system, it's not very easy. That's why I fight it at this point. Once you establish it, it's very hard to close it down, because it is in effect, at least in the short term, a cash cow for a government. That happens with so much legislation that is passed, that a new government takes over, sees that it is easy money, and has a difficult time denying itself that source of revenue. That makes me extremely concerned.

Jock Ferguson has always over the years written some very good investigative stories. They've annoyed a lot of people over the years who have perhaps been on the wrong side of the law. But he has expressed some concern in a Globe and Mail article of November 17, a concern that I have, and that is, how do you get offtrack betting in your bar or your tavern, and why don't the other people in the city have the same opportunity?

I've had a number of people in my community of St Catharines call me to say they have been questioning the method by which people are chosen to have this opportunity to have offtrack betting in their establishment. Some people said they didn't even know it was available; others said they didn't know how to get on the list, and why was one bar allowed to have it and not other bars? Because it gave a distinct advantage. Though they don't get a commission, they do gather people in there who spend money then on food and beverages.

I note in this article a quote which I think is from Mr Rod Seiling, who is with the Ontario Jockey Club. I think it's quoting him saying, "I recognized very early on that there was potential to be offered an inducement to award a franchise to a specific person, so every time I go out I have a second person with me....I'm not alone." So there is an admission there that there is at least a remote possibility that some kind of influence can be brought to bear so that one person gets designated as the bar or tavern over somebody else.

I well recall, though I don't want to go into this history, and some members of this House will recall how you used to get a liquor licence in Ontario, and that was you had to hire the right Tory lawyer or make a donation to the Tory bagman and you got a liquor licence. Well, over the years that was eliminated. They eventually had so many liquor licences that it wasn't required. I have a fear that that's how people are going to get on this list, that there's always that possibility.

Mr Seiling has said: "We have a set of internal criteria to judge the sites and hopefully we find someone we believe would make a good partner. We used this process with Sudbury Downs in the north to select site locations and we think it has worked quite well."

I don't think that internal criteria ever work well. I think the public is entitled to know what the criteria are that are being used to select one bar or one tavern over another in awarding the right to have offtrack betting. It invites influence peddling; it invites favouritism; it invites patronage. I'm not saying that's happened to this point in time, but the danger is there and I must express that concern on behalf of a number of people in my community who own establishments and are not happy that they have not had the same opportunity as other establishments.

To go back to casino gambling for a moment, although I don't want to flog what apparently is a dead horse around here, it's very hard for the Windsor members to resist it because of course everybody's eager when it happens. It's something new. It's like anything new in a community: It looks good, it sounds good, and you have to ask yourself 15 years later whether it was worth it.

If you talk to people, they say, "There are jobs there." They're happy. It's very hard to make the arguments against some of the reasons put forward in favour of a casino. Unfortunately, the only thing a person can do is to 10 or 15 years later say, "I told you so," and you don't want to be in that position. You would hope things would work out.

But I worry about the movement towards more and more and more gambling opportunities in our province. There's even a battle going on between the National Basketball Association and the province over betting. I must say that in principle, though I'm not going to get in the middle of that particular battle, I see a danger in all betting on sports events because it does allow for the danger of people throwing an event, throwing a game or influencing the point spread so that people can win a lot of money. I don't like that opportunity in sport, and never have. There was a scandal in baseball many, many years ago that involved that. Now that we have gambling on these games in some places, it does pose some concerns for me that that can happen. That's in a general sense as opposed to getting into the middle of this latest battle between the government and one section of the business community.

I also must express concern about the high-alcohol beer. That isn't new. As some of my friends on the other side have interjected in the past, it's not necessarily new. What I am concerned about is that the two major companies, Labatt, and then Molson of course would feel compelled to meet that competition, have come out with what was called 7.1% beer, some kind of ice beer, heavy ice or deep ice --

Hon Frances Lankin (Minister of Economic Development and Trade): Maximum.

Mr Bradley: Maximum Ice.

I don't know if you could draw the conclusion, but my colleague Carman McClelland asked the question in the House yesterday about this. There is an increase in the number of people who have been found drinking and driving, and some people have attributed this to the fact that a lot of people don't realize, because they're used to drinking other kinds of beer, perhaps a light beer or regular beer, that the alcoholic content is higher in these beers, and as a result we have people getting intoxicated more quickly.

So I express concern about it. They're marketed with a lot of fanfare. I know the companies now are getting a reaction so they're starting to backtrack a bit and say, "Drink responsibly," but I think that's the danger, particularly for young people. That beer is probably the cheapest alcoholic beverage they can consume, and for that reason it particularly affects young people. I don't want to see that happening. I hope the companies will look at that carefully. I don't know whether you can get into regulating how much alcohol you're putting in beer -- that's sometimes difficult -- but I flag that as a concern in the future.

1920

All of us have received in this House letters from people who are concerned about a diminishing of the number of medical services they can receive from government. I'm not irresponsible enough to say there is an unlimited amount of money to spend on everything -- there isn't -- but I hope when the government makes these decisions, it evaluates carefully the ramifications for people. I have always believed, as I know most members of this House have, that there should not be one rule for the rich and one rule for the rest; that there should not be one kind of medical care available to the rich and the privileged in this province and another level for other people.

I become concerned when I hear people who have to spend $300 or $400 a month on drugs because they don't have a drug plan. We in this Legislature have a drug plan so we're covered, or I think 90%. I worry when certain drugs are not provided to people who need them, lifesaving or certainly health-saving drugs, and we start seeing those withdrawn from the list. I hope the government would not do so in any cases where those drugs are in any way essential to people.

In a very parochial sense, I want to emphasize again my support for the Lincoln County Board of Education and the support of my colleagues in the Niagara region who attended a meeting with the board for appropriate funding for Governor Simcoe Secondary School additional facilities. My friends the member for St Catharines-Brock and the member for Lincoln attended in St Catharines, because we are involved with the Lincoln County Board of Education through our boundaries. We have been involved in discussions with the board about the potential funding of Governor Simcoe Secondary School.

As I mentioned last week in this House, the Lincoln County Board of Education came to an amicable but difficult settlement with the separate school board when it transferred Grantham High School, my old high school, to the Lincoln County Roman Catholic Separate School Board. As part of that agreement -- this is in the context of across the province -- there were battles going on where there were not easy transfers and the government had to order transfers. They did it. Despite a lot of pressure, they did it in a peaceful fashion and a responsible fashion and under great difficulty and duress. I believe that as a result, the money that has been provided for Lakeport, I understand, is now appropriate, and the member for St Catharines-Brock and the member for Lincoln and I would be delighted to see the Ministry of Education provide the kind of funding the Lincoln County Board of Education is looking for for Governor Simcoe Secondary School. I know the member for St Catharines-Brock has communicated that through government sources, and I add my support to that in a more public way, which members of the opposition are allowed to do, I guess.

I was delighted, as you were, Madam Chair and others, to be present when the Premier announced once again that the Ministry of Transportation was being moved to St Catharines and the Ministry of Culture, Tourism and Recreation to Niagara Falls. Even though it was about the fifth time it was announced, I'm still happy to see everybody gathered together with smiles on their faces, because all of us believe, those of us from the peninsula, that again it's important to have the investment of those jobs in a very depressed area.

Whenever, as I've mentioned on many occasions, somebody asks me, "What do you think of this?" I say, "Whenever one government follows through on the promise and commitment of another government, particularly when I agree with that commitment, I am delighted," and although there was a great photograph in the Welland-Port Colborne Tribune, all we had in the St Catharines Standard was the Premier playing the piano, as he does, and the mayor and the Premier. Somehow the photograph of the member for St Catharines-Brock, the member for St Catharines, the member for Niagara Falls and the member for Lincoln did not appear. I don't know how that happened, but I'm sure something happened in the developing room and it didn't appear.

But I think it's important that we keep moving forward with that project, just as I mentioned in the House this afternoon the Jordan Bridge project which is on the books and ready to move. All of us would like to see that accelerated as much as possible. I know Mayor Konkle, who will be meeting tomorrow with representatives of the Transportation ministry, will want to see that happen as well, because we had a very tragic accident last week and we've had some other accidents that have happened along there. Those of us who are from the Niagara Peninsula know that from time to time the traffic is completely tied up and people are rerouted through the town of Lincoln, at great inconvenience to the people of the town of Lincoln and at risk to their safety, and at inconvenience to the drivers.

I also want to speak briefly on the law-and-order issues, perhaps not in the same tone as my friend the member for Leeds-Grenville did this afternoon, but I do want to put on the record again the concerns that the people of the Niagara Peninsula have about crimes that have been committed and the potential for people making money from those crimes.

Of course all of us are disgusted, regardless of what our political affiliation or background happens to be, by the crime cards that are on sale or potentially on sale. I think we have to do everything possible within our jurisdiction and within the law to prevent this from happening. When that is not available, I think the public outcry against them should be sustained so that those who would perpetrate this on us are people who would be looked down upon by our society.

In addition to this, I have been, as have many people in our community, on many occasions in the presence of the family of Kristen French, who was so tragically and brutally murdered some time ago. I will not go into the details of the case, as it's before the courts, other than to say that I think we owe it to that family and to the friends of Kristen French to do everything we possibly can to avoid those kinds of crimes being committed in the future.

The penalties have to be appropriate. The conditions which breed criminals of that kind have to be changed. That does not come quickly or easily, but we should be focusing on those issues because they're important to people we meet in our daily lives.

It means we have to support our police forces as they fight that crime. To do so is sometimes not easy, because again they're competing with other ministries and other organizations for the dollars that are out there, but I think they deserve the support. Many of them attended, by the way, the funeral of Kristen French, and certainly it was easy to see in their faces and their eyes that they felt very bad about this circumstance and were determined to investigate fully and had the resources to do so.

I also want to say in this House that I hope those who have been affected indirectly are appropriately compensated. I have directed letters to the appropriate authorities within the government indicating my support for, for instance, people who have owned property which has been occupied by people who are suspects. The Attorney General is looking into this matter and I know will give it her full attention and will feel sympathetic towards those who are the innocent victims in this case. I think some progress has been made, and perhaps I'll receive a letter some day saying that the people are fully satisfied with both the short-term and long-term compensation that has been provided.

I saw the Sewell commission here this afternoon and I was pleased to see them here. Some of my colleagues and I don't always agree on everything. I would hope the effect of the Sewell commission report would be that we would see the preservation of agricultural land but, as important, the preservation of farmers in our area as well.

These are difficult times for agriculture. We all know that, but I hope and encourage the government, as do, I know, the members of the Preservation of Agricultural Lands Society, which in their last newsletter said they had a government sympathetic to their needs and to their aspirations. I haven't seen the reason for that optimism over the last three years, but perhaps they believe that to be the case. But I've always been a strong supporter of the preservation of agricultural land and I hope that when we're not in session the government will continue to look at that.

1930

I expressed concern about the increase in non-tax revenue of this government, that is, on charges for various services that the government provides, such as licensing, and say that they hit everybody. It doesn't just hit the rich, it doesn't just hit those who are capable of paying, but it hits people who on an everyday basis have to meet costs when they might be unemployed or on social services. I think of such things as birth certificates and marriage certificates, death certificates, licences to drive vehicles and so on, and it doesn't take into account a person's ability to pay.

I want to make a plea for the government of Ontario, when it's allocating its capital funds, to provide sufficient funding for sewer and water works in the Niagara region, in the individual municipalities and in the region as a whole, so that we can have our sewage treatment plants and water treatment plants working appropriately and providing a service to people in our area. I think that provides jobs. It provides an infrastructure that is useful in the long term and, in addition to that, assists in the improvement of our environment.

Another project that will be coming forth that I would like to say I hope the government of Ontario can participate in is an improvement to the Royal Canadian Henley Regatta course in St Catharines, which may require some work to bring it up to standards for world competition. We would love to see the world competition again in St Catharines, and I hope that the Ontario government will give serious consideration to all representations which are made by the Canadian Henley Rowing Corp, the St Catharines Rowing Club and the rowing community at large for improvements to that watercourse.

I could go on at some length. I am told by my colleagues that they expected I was not going to go beyond 30 minutes.

Mr Steven W. Mahoney (Mississauga West): Keep going till Hans arrives.

Mr Bradley: I am told that I have the opportunity to keep going until one of my colleagues arrives. I want to read into the record a letter to do with graduated licensing, which I in principle support. I've given the letter to the Minister of Transportation. The Minister of Education is very interested in this because the letter is addressed to him, as would be many other people. It reads as follows:

"Dear Mr Cooke:

"On behalf of the more than 65,000 students represented by the Ontario Co-operative Education Association, I'm writing to express the association's concerns regarding the level 1 requirements of the impending graduated licensing legislation.

As you are no doubt aware, cooperative education is a means of teaching and learning which, at the secondary school level, affords students opportunities to have workplace assignments in the community. These assignments, or cooperative education experiences, are offered on a half-day and full-day basis and allow students opportunities to earn credits towards their Ontario secondary diploma.

"Many times, such placements extend well beyond the 'normal' school day and take place from 7 am until 7 pm, and sometimes above these hours. In addition, such cooperative placements extend into the summer months. The point here is that co-op, while a school-sanctioned program, moves school beyond the boundaries of the traditional classroom and extends beyond the time constraints of the traditional 'academic calendar.'

"Cooperative education programs have proven themselves to be a resounding success in helping students to:

"(i) make the successful transition from secondary school to further education and/or work;

"(ii) gain acceptance into limited enrolment programs at the post-secondary level;

"(iii) make informed career and educational decisions on the basis of firsthand experience and knowledge; and

"(iv) integrate into the Ontario workplace and community.

"The effect of the level 1 requirements of the legislation, as proposed, will impact negatively on the delivery of cooperative education programs in a number of ways, and these are:

"(i) Many students in rural and urban areas use their own vehicles to travel to and from their placements. In rural areas, this occurs because of the vast distances involved and because there is no public transportation system available. Students and parents assume the costs and liability involved in order to be able to participate. This legislation would prohibit such participation. Indeed, Kenora states that 90% of its co-op students use their own vehicles. Clearly, this legislation would have a serious negative impact on the number of students who could be involved in co-op.

"(ii) Given that many students use their own vehicles, transportation costs are minimized for these boards of education. Where public transit does exist, these boards would now have to pay such costs. Where no public transit exists, the boards would have to pay taxi fares for their co-op students or cancel the co-op program altogether.

"(iii) Cooperative education programs are attractive to adolescents and to the thousands of recently arrived immigrant learners. Again, these recent arrivals to Canada would no longer have access to a program which enables them to integrate into Ontario society in a meaningful and productive manner.

"(iv) Many programs, specifically though not uniquely in rural areas, have entire courses designed around a common occupational theme, eg, law. Many of these placements are located long distances from students' schools and their own communities. Driving for these students is a must. To prohibit driving would result in the cancellation of such programs in their entirety.

"It should be pointed out that this legislation would impact not only upon traditional forms of cooperative education but also on other ministry-sponsored programs with an experiential component, such as secondary school workplace apprenticeship programs and regular apprenticeship programs.

"The Ontario Co-operative Education Association wholeheartedly supports the spirit and intent of this legislation. Many of its members are parents and share the government's concerns for the safety and wellbeing of this province's youth. This support notwithstanding, given the aforementioned very real concerns about the negative impact upon cooperative education programs, I would ask your government to consider:

"(i) An exemption vis-à-vis level 1 requirements for any student participating in a bona fide cooperative education program;

"(ii) That such an exemption be year-round to cover summer school programs, but only for the days and duration of the placement as specified on a student's work education agreement form; and

"(iii) that the hours of exemption be from 7 am to 7 pm only.

"The association acknowledges the tardiness of this response. However, since we were only quite recently apprised of the ministry's granting opportunities for community input regarding this legislation, I would request that you consider favourably these concerns and recommendations.

"In conclusion, the association trusts that the spirit of cooperation which has existed in the past between the Ministry of Transportation and the Ministry of Education and Training will prevail, and that a way will be found through your collective goodwill to respect the intent of the legislation while at the same time preserving a most worthwhile educational program."

"Sincerely yours,

"Gay Kleiber, President,

"The Ontario Co-operative Education Association."

I have received this from Darlene Cuthbert, the co-op coordinator for the Lincoln County Board of Education.

Now I won't have to read this into the record when this bill is discussed for third reading. I hope the government can incorporate this, if not through an amendment to the legislation then through regulation, because I think it would be helpful. I certainly support the contents of this and I commend this to the government.

I'm going to wrap up now. I believe the Progressive Conservative Party has a speaker who wishes to make a contribution, and I look forward to hearing the remarks of that speaker.

The Acting Speaker: Questions or comments to the member for St Catharines? Seeing none, further debate?

Mr David Turnbull (York Mills): My constituents in York Mills are concerned about the direction this government is taking our economy. They're concerned at the fact that this government has consistently tried to find ways of sucking cash out of the taxpayer, the people who are already some of the most heavily taxed people in the whole of North America. We've heard all the excuses that the government has to offer ad nauseam, but the fact is that we are just about the most heavily taxed administration in North America. Certainly of the large economies, of the large states or provinces, we are indeed just about the most heavily taxed province.

1940

Hon David S. Cooke (Minister of Education and Training): No, no, no, no.

Hon Mr Turnbull: The interesting thing is that when we make this charge, and we've made this charge before, the government always jumps in and says, "No, no, no, that's not true." I hear the present Minister of Education making the usual charge: "That's not true." Well, it's interesting. That's what the major economists are telling us.

Hon Mr Cooke: Add in health insurance premiums.

Mr Turnbull: The Minister of Education says, "Add in health insurance premiums," and indeed that is true. That is a factor that has to be taken into the equation, and indeed that is one of the reasons the automobile companies have considered that Ontario is a reasonably friendly administration. I give that to you.

However, the fact is that overall, the burden on businesses is so worrisome that businesses are concluding they don't want to stay here and they don't want to expand here and new businesses don't want to come here. The last category, the businesses that don't want to come here, is something which, quite frankly, you'll never nail down. If the government asks us, "Give us statistics," it is impossible to give statistics about the people who have decided not to come here. They just simply look at the whole political and economic spectrum and they conclude it isn't a good environment.

This is a government which has been running deficits at some 25% over revenues. Let's just put this in the context of our own households or the small business. How many households or how many businesses could survive for very long were they to spend 25% more than they were taking in? I would suggest to you not very many and certainly not for very long.

What has the government done? Well, the government has spent money in every conceivable area. They make bleating complaints that the federal government hasn't given them adequate transfers. The fact is that the federal government has increased the transfers to this province every year since this government has been in power, at greater than the rate of inflation. The counterbalancing argument the government would make would be to say, "We've got more people on welfare." The fact is that the previous government, the Liberals, increased the amount of payout to people on welfare at a rate that the federal government didn't agree with. They said, "Look, if you do it, you are on your own."

Hon Mr Cooke: So why did they cap Alberta and B.C.?

Mr Turnbull: The fact is that the federal government said Ontario, B.C. and Alberta were the so-called "have" provinces -- so-called -- and that they weren't going to increase them at a rate which was incompatible with their budget.

Let's face it: Provincial governments and the federal government throughout Canada have been spending more money than they've got. When you look at the basic problem and you cut through all of the political rhetoric and you simply say: "It doesn't matter which political party's in power, you're all spending more than you're taking in," how can you do this?

I don't subscribe to Keynesian economics because Keynesian economics is fundamentally flawed. But in fairness to John Maynard Keynes, the fact is that Keynes at least said that during the good years you put money back to pay for the years that you have primed the pump. I think, quite frankly, all political parties have failed fundamentally in this. Let's not just point the finger at the NDP. All political parties have spent more than they're taking in. We are now reaping those years, the fact that we have no capability to prime the pump.

Let's just look at what this government has seen fit to spend money on. When you start talking in billions, people's eyes glaze over. They don't understand it.

This is a government that spent $50,000 on creating a new union song. That is really tremendously important to the taxpayers.

They spent $20,000 to send a group of union activists to a school to teach them humour. I'll tell you the humour: The humour is that we are bankrupt and the government doesn't even realize it. That's the basic problem that we have.

When you spend 25% more than you're taking in, pretty simple math -- without doing new math, which I never understand -- pretty soon tells you that you are going to spend yourself into such a situation that it's almost irrecoverable. This government has doubled the debt of this province in three years, and I've spoken on this over and over. They belong in the Guinness Book of Records in terms of increasing the debt.

It means that the next government -- and it won't be the NDP -- will have to try and dig us out of it. That's going to require some pretty drastic measures, and all I would say is that we have to be prepared to take those measures. Anybody who might be crazy enough to be watching the Legislature at this time of night has got to tighten their belt and recognize the fact that it doesn't matter what party is in power, we have to stop spending our children into the poorhouse.

The Acting Speaker: Any questions or comments to the member?

Mr Robert V. Callahan (Brampton South): Just a quick one I want to make in terms of spending the future of our children. I've just been distributing a letter around this Legislature in terms of putting a new drug for schizophrenics on the formulary. There's a place where we could spend dollars wisely and save money down the line in terms of Corrections, Health, Community and Social Services.

So in the spirit of Christmas, I urge you, when you're talking to your colleagues, to think about that. Let's start spending the dollars wisely, and even if we have deficits, they'll be spent in the proper way.

The Acting Speaker: Are there any other questions or comments? Seeing none, the member for York Mills has two minutes if he wishes.

Mr Turnbull: My colleague suggests that we should spend more by adding a drug to the formulary. Quite frankly, I don't have the specialized knowledge to know whether that's appropriate. I suspect it is appropriate. Many of the cutbacks that this government is making in terms of not listing drugs on the formulary and delisting drugs probably in the long term will cost us more in terms of the cost to society and all of the costs associated with that in terms of housing people and the correctional facilities.

But the fundamental message I gave is that we cannot continue to spend our children's money and our grandchildren's money, and the sooner all political parties wake up to this and start talking about how they can cut the cost of government, the better we will be served, the better the taxpayers will be served and the sooner we'll be able to create meaningful jobs for our children which will ensure that they will have the prosperous future in this great province that we've had. That is the most important thing, because we want to make sure that our children have the same opportunities that we've enjoyed.

The Acting Speaker: Further debate? Seeing none, would the Attorney General wish to make any closing comments?

Hon Mrs Boyd: No, Madam Speaker.

The Acting Speaker: Mrs Boyd, on behalf of Mr Laughren, has moved second reading of Bill 140. Is it the pleasure of the House that the motion carry? Carried.

Hon Mrs Boyd: On behalf of the Minister of Finance, I move third reading of the supply bill.

The Acting Speaker: Do we have agreement to pursue third reading? Agreed.

Mrs Boyd, on behalf of Mr Laughren, has moved third reading of the supply bill, Bill 140. Would you care to make any comments?

Further debate? Seeing none, is it the pleasure of the House that the motion carry? Carried.

Resolved that the bill do now pass and be entitled as in the motion.

1950

HIGHWAY TRAFFIC AMENDMENT ACT (DIMENSIONS AND WEIGHT), 1993 / LOI DE 1993 MODIFIANT LE CODE DE LA ROUTE (DIMENSIONS ET POIDS)

Mrs Boyd, on behalf of Mr Pouliot, moved third reading of Bill 74, An Act to amend the Highway Traffic Act / Projet de loi 74, Loi modifiant le Code de la route.

The Acting Speaker (Ms Margaret H. Harrington): Would you care to make any opening comments? Further debate?

Mr Hans Daigeler (Nepean): Frankly, I'm surprised that the minister is not here. Both of us stayed yesterday till midnight, and last week I think we stayed till midnight and we didn't make it. I thought perhaps he'd stay around or give his parliamentary assistant an opportunity to speak, because frankly he spoke quite well in the committee. I think he did a good job.

Oh, there he is; there is the minister. I'm glad to see that the minister's still here and that at least those who are interested in transportation are staying around before we recess, because both of the bills that we're discussing still are important ones. One, Bill 74, allows longer trucks, not monster trucks, as both the government party and the third party used to say when the Liberal Minister of Transportation first proposed this. But, as they say, that was then and now is now.

On that matter, as I said on second reading, I would agree that better late than never, that both the government and the third party realized that this is a measure that is important for the trucking industry itself and, by implication, for the industry at large in this province. Because of that, we support it. I have been supporting it strongly since I've become critic for Transportation for my party.

I should say that I appreciate that the minister did agree to accept the amendment I put forward allowing as well longer motorcoaches, because the tourism industry and the motorcoach industry have made very forceful representation to us that Ontario is losing a lot of money because of the inability of some of the motorcoach operators to compete on the same basis as some of the American operators.

I do say that it doesn't happen too often that the government accepts amendments, certainly not on the floor of the House, but in this case the minister did. I thank him for this and we appreciate it.

In the spirit of Christmas, this is all I did want to say, since we have been asked to be rather short in our comments. We have spoken, and I have spoken, at some length at second reading and at earlier times, and again I do think this is a measure whose time has come. If anybody is interested in the more detailed reasoning behind this, obviously the information is available, from myself, the third party or the government. We'd be pleased to provide the details as to why this measure is taken and what the benefit of this measure is for the people of Ontario.

Mr David Turnbull (York Mills): This is a bill which the government should have basically enacted within its first year of office. We do not enjoy a level playing field because in fact -- I've got some important communication coming in here; like most Liberal comments, I'll file it in the appropriate drawer -- the truck lengths in Ontario are not the same as Quebec, western Canada or the US interstate system. We desperately need to do this. This is the right measure. It's three years too late.

The only caveat I have is that in second reading debate I challenged the minister. I take him at his word and I will certainly hold him to his word that indeed the legislation as drafted will allow the ministry the flexibility under the regulations to allow the longer buses -- in fact, we've had an amendment to that effect -- and also that the overhang of the auto transporters where they load on automobiles on to truck transporters will allow the three-foot overhang in the front and four-foot overhang in the rear which is allowed in the US, which would still be within the confines of the total limitation of the length within this bill.

The minister has commented that he will consult on this overhang with the group of people he consulted with, which was indeed fairly large, including the trucking industry and various other interest groups: the Hamilton Automobile Club, the CAA and so forth.

We urge the government to treat that as a matter of urgency, to consult with these people, so that we can achieve 10 automobiles per truck so that the automobile transportation in this province will be on a competitive basis with the US, because indeed Ontario does have a competitive advantage against some of the US auto makers and a lot of the automobiles that are produced in Ontario are shipped to the US. Those which are shipped to the southern part of the US are shipped by train; those which are shipped to the northern states are shipped predominantly by truck. In order that we can assure these Canadian companies a profitable operation, they need to be able to ship 10 automobiles, not the nine that they're currently transporting.

I take the minister's assurance that this is within the purview of the regulations for him to achieve and I hope, in wrapping up, that the minister will assure us of such.

Hon Gilles Pouliot (Minister of Transportation): I welcome the opportunity to offer closing debate, closing comments in this case, and they shall be brief, for all has been said about this economic initiative.

Simply put, it's a benefit for the industry. It also benefits the public, all Ontarians. It renders us more competitive, to the tune of in excess of $100 million a year. It's no less than one important step in the economic recovery of Ontario. In terms of numbers, shippers and manufacturers are looking at $100 million in benefit. Bill 74 is simply an economic initiative. You've heard our government talk at great length vis-à-vis safety. Bill 74 does not compromise safety. Quite the contrary, it enhances safety by virtue of the components of the regulations associated with longer trucks and buses.

I wish to thank members, my colleagues of course, people at MTO, certainly not least nor last the official opposition and members of the third party. This is an initiative where we worked together. Bill 74's time has come, its time is now, and I look forward to having third reading, royal assent, and then let the marketplace take over. Thank you kindly.

The Acting Speaker: Mrs Boyd, on behalf of Mr Pouliot, has moved third reading of Bill 74, An Act to amend the Highway Traffic Act. Is it the pleasure of the House that the motion carry? Carried.

Resolved that the bill do now pass and be entitled as in the motion.

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HIGHWAY TRAFFIC AMENDMENT ACT (NOVICE DRIVERS), 1993 / LOI DE 1993 MODIFIANT LE CODE DE LA ROUTE (CONDUCTEURS DÉBUTANTS)

Mr Pouliot moved third reading of the following bill:

Bill 122, An Act to amend the Highway Traffic Act / Projet de loi 122, Loi modifiant le Code de la route.

The Acting Speaker (Ms Margaret H. Harrington): Minister, would you wish to make a brief comment?

Hon Gilles Pouliot (Minister of Transportation): They shall be brief indeed. There's been vast consultation in all corners of all special parts of Ontario. This is more than two years in the making. Its vision is to make Ontario roads again, one more time, the safest in North America. Young and new drivers represent 15% of the overall driving population and yet they're now 32% of fatalities. They're way overrepresented, twice the average indeed.

We had to do something. It's our vision. It relates to safety. It puts more of an obligation, not a reverse onus but more of a focus, on the people who are entering the system. It respects the right of people to access the privilege of driving the roads of Ontario.

One more time I wish to thank members of the opposition for reminding themselves that this is cause for celebration in the collective. Everybody benefits by Bill 122, graduated drivers' licences, long awaited indeed in a neighbourhood, at a driving school, in a driveway near you in the spring of 1994.

I feel so proud to have been associated with this initiative. At Transportation it is a flagship indeed. A good day today.

Mr David Turnbull (York Mills): I've heard this speech used so often, in all kinds of contexts, that all I can say is that I'm so disappointed that the minister didn't mention this must be win, win, win. I would maybe ask the minister to correct the record.

Mr Steven Offer (Mississauga North): I'd like, in the short time allotted on this bill, to put a few comments on the record. With this bill I think there is and has always been general approval for its passage. It's interesting that, as one went on in the discussion around the bill, there were so many groups and associations that were taking credit for the bill itself, for the principle of the bill and for its creation, its initial idea.

The interesting thing is that, though this bill has had a great deal of approval from many quarters throughout the province, it also in a strange way underlines the weakness of our system. The weakness is that there weren't public hearings on this bill. I think we should recognize, as we speak in support of the legislation, that we missed a great opportunity, and that is an opportunity to have public hearings where we could ask young people, kids who are 13, 14, 15 and 16 years old, to come before a legislative committee to share with us their thoughts on this particular piece.

I say that because I've had the opportunity of speaking at some schools in my riding. I've spoken at a high school in Streetsville, I've spoken at John Fraser high school in my riding, and it was wonderful to hear the reaction of 14- and 15-year-olds to this piece of legislation. They understood this legislation, they saw what it was designed to achieve and they saw the weaknesses in the legislation. There were some very refreshing thoughts and comments on a piece of legislation which will, without question, affect them.

As we speak in support of the legislation, we must also recognize that we have unwittingly missed a great opportunity, an opportunity to use our legislative process and our committee process to send out a message to the young people in this province that they could have taken part, that we could have listened, that they do have important opinions on a piece of legislation which will primarily affect them.

This legislation would have really sent out a second message, not only about the safety on the roads and the two-tier system of driving and the actual makeup of the legislation but, to a whole bunch of young people in this province, one that says that in our legislative process they have a role to play, a place to play, an opportunity to be heard, comments that are important.

I would imagine a number of other members in the Legislature spoke and took this bill to different high schools in their areas and also had that experience. It is unfortunate that we couldn't have in a more formal way embraced the vibrancy, the honesty, the care and the commitment of our young people, who really did want to speak about this legislation and who unfortunately were not able to.

But I am in favour of the legislation, I'm in favour of its direction, I'm in favour of what I believe it attempts to do and will, I hope, achieve. For that, I just wanted to put a few words on record on this bill.

Mr Robert V. Callahan (Brampton South): As my colleague has said, we're in favour of this in terms of its safety, but I still have to bring to the minister's attention the fact that under the statutory conditions of the Insurance Act, if you take a scenario where a young driver is 10 minutes after the magical hour of 12 and, through no fault of his own, winds up in a serious accident, there will be no coverage for the car he's driving.

If there's a serious injury which reaches the threshold under the present insurance legislation whereby $1 million or whatever is paid out, the insurance company will be required to pay that amount to the injured party, but it can turn around and it can sue the person whose car was being driven at the time.

I think the public of this province should be aware of that, that the insurance industry is really getting a gift under this proposal. There should be built into the legislation an exception that if a person could demonstrate that he is driving outside the parameters of the graduated licence through no fault of his own, any damages or injuries that occur would have to be paid for by the insurance companies. I don't believe the insurance companies should get a free lunch, and that's precisely what you're giving them.

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As I say, I support the principle of the bill, but there's a very serious flaw in this bill in terms of the fact that a person could be off coverage through no fault of their own and wind up without any recovery for their property damage, or perhaps being sued by an insurer who pays out a large sum of money on a threshold application. I'm sure, Minister, you don't expect that.

I've read the Hansards from the committee reports and apparently the insurance companies took the position that if they're off coverage, it's the same as if they're off coverage for anything: driving under suspension, driving while impaired. I suggest that's not the case at all. Young people may very well find themselves on a 400 highway not because they want to be there but because they have to be there, or changing a tire or whatever other reason, and I suggest there should be an exception to that type of situation. So I urge you to do that.

The Acting Speaker: Further questions and comments?

Mr Turnbull: I wasn't going to comment at all, but I just simply couldn't resist the urge to comment to the member for Brampton South that he's obviously addressing his comments to the next bill that we're going to be handling and not the longer truck legislation.

Mr Callahan: I appreciate it, because I will apply it to the next bill. I thought this was graduated licences.

Interjection.

Mr Callahan: The member is wrong. This is the graduated licences bill.

The Acting Speaker: Further comments and questions on the speech by the member for Mississauga North? The member for Mississauga North has two minutes to respond.

Mr Offer: I'm not going to use the two minutes, but I do want to put on record my thanks to the young people in my riding who did take the time to share their thoughts with me, especially the students at Streetsville Secondary School and John Fraser, who had the time really to share opinions on a piece of legislation that is going to affect them. For that, as the MPP for Mississauga North, I feel quite confident in voting in support of this legislation.

The Acting Speaker: Further debate on the third reading of Bill 122?

Mr Turnbull: Madam Speaker, I do correct the record. I didn't hear that we'd moved over to Bill 122. This is one of the troubles. What happens towards the end of the session is that all of these bills are pressed through so we make sure we get out on time. Anybody watching this has really got to wonder about the situation as to how we pass laws in this province.

When we talk to Bill 122, graduated licensing is something that we are only going to get implemented in the spring of 1994. We should have had it two years ago. It's legislation which is good. It's ironic, as I've stated on many occasions before, that the government has been so slow in implementing graduated licensing, yet indeed it has pushed through photo-radar in a matter of weeks, because that's a cash grab. We need this legislation. I have been convinced that in fact graduated licences are appropriate.

In response to the comments that were made by Mr Callahan, the member for Brampton South, just to explain how this works in case you haven't read the bill, if somebody is out after midnight and their car breaks down, and then they have to repair it and it takes them past midnight, if they're in level 1, then quite simply the accompanying driver can drive the car home. So they don't have to risk their licence or their insurance. In the case of the people who are in level 2, there is no restriction on them driving beyond midnight, so that comment is not terribly valid.

The overwhelming number of people in Ontario are in favour of this. In CTV's National Driving Test, of the 31,000 respondents by telephone to their questions, they overwhelmingly said that they wanted to see tougher regulations. In fact the suggestion was that the government's regulations weren't tough enough, although I have been persuaded by the very professional staff at the Ministry of Transportation that anything of a tougher nature would be detrimental to getting acceptance throughout the province, and I bow to that.

We have made an improvement to this legislation in the sense that we're only going to allow one driver in the front seat, which will be the accompanying driver in level 1, and that's a move in the right direction. Anything we can do to improve road safety is good, which is different from the legislation the government has brought forward with respect to photo-radar, which is purely a cash grab, and the government has failed to demonstrate it is not a cash grab by the fact that it has adamantly refused to dedicate those funds to road safety.

They have also refused to allow that there would be wording inserted in the photo-radar bill to say that this would be strictly a six-month test and that it would end at the end of that six months and that it would be reviewed by committee. They've studiously ignored that. They've also studiously ignored the suggestion my party has made that we allow a deposition about who the driver of the vehicle was so the ticket could be directed to the driver as opposed to the owner of the vehicle.

But that's not unusual, because this government is more intent on revenue generation than on safety. It's unfortunate. But this particular bill, Bill 122, is a good measure and we applaud it. Let's get on, get it implemented. Why do we have to wait till the spring?

Mr Hans Daigeler (Nepean): I will have to take a little bit more time than on the previous bill. The previous bill was the longer truck bill and this one is the graduated licences, just to make sure we all know what we're talking about.

On the previous bill, the minister did accept two of my amendments which were rather significant. I did move some amendments on this bill as well, and unfortunately the minister did not see fit to accept those amendments. I do want to say what these amendments were. They were quite serious.

The one was to make it easier for the rural people and people in northern Ontario to get into the driving experience as younger people. Right now, if you're in level 1 -- that's the first eight or 12 months, depending on whether you have driver education -- you have to have an accompanying driver who has at least four years' driving experience.

My amendment, the amendment of my party, would have reduced that requirement to two years, or essentially, once you are fully licensed, you can be an accompanying driver. We feel this would have helped the acceptance of this measure in the rural areas and in the north. Unfortunately, the minister did not agree to accept this amendment.

Also, since we would have reduced, as it were, the age where you can be an accompanying driver, the second amendment I made was of even greater importance if that first amendment had been accepted. That second amendment was to have only zero blood alcohol for the accompanying driver. Right now, the accompanying driver can have 0.05% alcohol in his blood, even though -- and that must be stressed -- the driver himself must be zero blood alcohol, no alcohol whatsoever. In any case, that too the minister did not accept, and I regret that because this is going to make it more difficult in the rural areas.

I should say to the minister that while I certainly support the bill, it is going to be difficult to be accepted across the province. Once I think the implications of this bill become known, it won't be quite as smooth as perhaps the minister is expecting. Certainly in terms of all the new tests that have to be established, it will take some time until this system is fully operational, and I frankly fully expect some difficulties and some problems that are going to be experienced. But I think with the reasonable approach that at least the ministry officials have shown so far in terms of enforcement and so on, we should be able to overcome those difficulties.

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I should say that I did receive today, somewhat belatedly, several faxes, at least 10 or 15, from various cooperative schools and they were asking for an exemption for their students.

Interjection.

Mr Daigeler: The minister is saying I should wrap up. I think, in respect to those people who have faxed me their letters, I should say that we're taking their comments seriously but unfortunately they are coming a bit late. We are already on third reading. There are no longer any amendments acceptable at third reading.

But I do want to say to those people who have faxed their concerns to me that, yes, that matter actually came up during the hearings we had in the summer. They weren't hearings on a bill but they were hearings on a plan that the minister had. During those hearings we did reflect on whether there should be any type of exemption. Frankly, the agreement of all those who were involved and who came before the committee was that it was simply too complicated to administer exemptions and that, rather, we were trying to make the system workable on its own without the need for any kinds of exemptions.

The final and fourth point that I want to make I think the member for Brampton South raised today and he already raised it last week. The minister, if he had given a proper answer at that time, could have avoided a lot of the concerns and the frustrations experienced by the member for Brampton South, because I think the minister at the time did not understand at all what the legitimate concern was of the member for Brampton South. His concern was, are the people going to be covered by insurance if they do not meet some of the conditions of the graduated licences program?

I asked that very question last summer, both of the ministry officials and of representatives of the insurance industry, because I did think and I certainly agree with the member for Brampton South that this is a very important question. The public must know about it and must know exactly what they're covered for and what they're not covered for.

I asked that question and I am on record as having received a pretty full and complete and in my opinion satisfactory answer from the ministry officials. Mr Hughes, by the way, did an excellent job, I think, in representing the interests of the ministry. On behalf of my party, I also want to thank him and his officials, who have been working on this for a long time, including when we were in government. So I want to say thank you to Mr Hughes for the work that he has done.

Both he and the representatives of the insurance industry said the following, and I just do want to quote this, Madam Speaker; it will not be too long. I think this could potentially be very important for some of the people who are covered or not covered by the insurance.

Here's what the insurance industry answered to my question as to when people are covered and when they're not covered. Mr Griffin said, on behalf of the insurance industry:

"Let me answer that by first starting by explaining the current situation, which is spelled out by statute," meaning by law. "Basically, it says that if a car is driven without legal authorization, it says if you're not authorized to drive by law, then there is no coverage for the collision portion of the policy. Obviously the accident benefits and the liability coverage apply. It puts the onus on the owner of the vehicle. You have to remember that the insurance is on the vehicle. It puts the onus on the owner of the vehicle to make sure that the people he or she is allowing to drive their vehicle have the proper licence."

He went on to explain a little bit further, but I'm skipping that. Then he also talks about "The statutory exclusion in the current policies," and that applies to all drivers, whether you are a new driver in the graduated licences program or you have quite a bit of experience. If you are not following the rules, if you are outside the legal conditions for driving a vehicle, you are not covered for that part. However, and here again the insurance industry is speaking, "You cannot exclude anyone from their coverage for their accident benefits, which covers their injury, their medical costs. If you personally are injured, there would be coverage. If, however, you are in a vehicle for which you're not licensed or you're not authorized, you don't have a licence or your licence has lapsed or been suspended and you do damage to the vehicle, there is no coverage for damage to the vehicle."

That's an important clarification that I wanted to repeat in this House, because that was essentially the member for Brampton South's question last week. I guess the minister failed to fully either hear or understand the question, but that's the answer that perhaps he should have given at the time. I want to put that on the record again for anyone who may be unclear as to what the insurance coverage is and what it is not. That kind of regulation applies, as I said, not just to people who are in the graduated licence system but to all drivers across the province.

With these comments, I do want to conclude my remarks and indicate again that way back in 1989 I already was on record as calling for this type of system. Certainly the Liberal Transportation minister of the time, Mr Wrye, was working already on bringing a similar kind of initiative into being. It has taken almost four years to bring it about, but as I said on the previous bill, better late than never.

I do support this particular initiative and I thank both the member for Mississauga North and the member for Renfrew North, who were with me on what we might call pre-hearings over the summer. Both of them were very active in their questions to those who came before us. I want to thank both of my Liberal colleagues for their work also in committee after the hearings were completed.

With those comments, I thank you, Madam Speaker.

Mr James J. Bradley (St Catharines): I'm going to be very, very brief. Because the minister didn't have a chance to be present for every possible second of my address earlier, I wanted to commend to him a letter which I provided to him earlier in the day, and I know he will read the transcript of the supply bill speech very carefully. This is a copy of a letter I received addressed to David Cooke, Minister of Education and Training, from the president of the Ontario Co-operative Education Association, and from Darlene Cuthbert, who is the coordinator for the Lincoln County Board of Education. I simply request that the minister give this consideration. I don't think at this stage, since we're in third reading, we can put an amendment in, but perhaps by regulation or by whatever method I urge the government to give serious consideration to the implementation of the request found in the letter from this association.

Mr Ron Eddy (Brant-Haldimand): I'm very concerned about the restrictions and constrictions of this House. Each speaker who gets up says it's impossible to change the bill at third reading. Is that correct? Is this not a democratic House? If there's something important that the minister is convinced should be changed, could we not change it? In a democratic House, why is it not possible?

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The Acting Speaker (Mrs Margaret Marland): Further questions and comments? Further debate? Would the honourable minister like to make his closing comments on third reading of Bill 122? The minister has no further comments.

The House is now dealing with third reading of Bill 122, which has been moved by the minister. All in favour of Bill 122, third reading? Shall the motion carry? Carried.

Be it resolved that the bill now do pass and be entitled as in the motion.

COUNTY OF SIMCOE ACT, 1993 / LOI DE 1993 SUR LE COMTÉ DE SIMCOE

Mr Hayes, on behalf of Mr Philip, moved third reading of Bill 51, An Act respecting the Restructuring of the County of Simcoe / Projet de loi 51, Loi concernant la restructuration du comté de Simcoe.

Mr Pat Hayes (Essex-Kent): I'm pleased to introduce Bill 51 for third reading. Bill 51, the County of Simcoe Act, 1993, will restructure municipal government in Simcoe county.

Bill 51 is a direct response to what the people of Simcoe county want. This is a local county study directed and endorsed by county council.

The county will now assume a policy-setting and coordinating role in strategic planning, economic development, land use planning and emergency planning. These changes will help the county function more efficiently in these difficult economic times.

We received input from several parties during the committee hearings that were held around the county this summer. As a result of the input received, the committee endorsed several amendments resolving a number of local concerns.

This bill will help make local government in Simcoe county more efficient and effective. It will reduce the number of municipalities and the number of county councillors in Simcoe, improving accountability and reducing costs. The county has begun the implementation process and the province has provided financial assistance to ensure a smooth transition for Simcoe county residents and municipalities.

I might add that I was very pleased, and I'd like to thank all the members from all three parties for their cooperation through this process. As a matter of fact, during clause-by-clause, all the amendments from the government were unanimously passed. I'm very pleased to say that the opposition really didn't have any amendments and that they supported this bill. I appreciate their support. Thank you very much.

The Acting Speaker (Mrs Margaret Marland): Mr Hayes, the member for Essex-Kent, the parliamentary assistant, has moved third reading of Bill 51. Are there any questions or comments? Further debate?

Mr Ron Eddy (Brant-Haldimand): Realizing of course that this is third reading and it's not possible to change a word in the bill no matter how urgent or desirable that may seem, we will proceed. I just have a few comments.

I would open by saying, are major changes required to the county of Simcoe, and if changes are required, how should they be made? The answer to that simply is, that's not for me to decide. It's simply that the council of the county of Simcoe has decided to make some changes and I must recognize that, and indeed we've seen it.

What a wonderful evening this is that a bill comes forward to this House that has been initiated locally and the government has seen fit to proceed with it. It's so different from the days when the regional government bills were proposed and restructuring was imposed on municipalities. In some cases, of course, that was a good thing and required and we have to recognize that, but the great shortcoming was that there was not enough local input to maintain community of interest. After all, what is a municipality? It's a community. What is a community? It's people. And what are people? They're you and I and our friends and relatives, and I think we all have an interest, or should have, in our municipal governments, and we're interested in the places we live and we want them to be the very best.

In this case, we realize that the changes are locally initiated, and that's certainly a good thing. The province of course can do anything it wishes with the municipalities. It can erect or establish municipalities. It can dissolve municipalities in the middle of the term of the elected council. Look at the town of Westminster in the county of Middlesex: dissolved in the middle of the term of the elected council with absolutely no chance of protest or review by the local people, and that's most unfortunate. That was one of the saddest days in municipal history when that happened, because it could have and should have worked out so differently.

There are many good things about this bill, and I'm pleased to support the changes, locally initiated. The elected head of every local municipality will now be the mayor. The county of Simcoe, which is the largest county in Ontario and deserves much more time than we're prepared to give it in this House -- and indeed we should do that. There was no debate, Madam Speaker, as you know, at second reading on this bill at all, so we had no opportunity whatsoever to voice any opinion. That's most unfortunate. The elected head of every local municipality in the county of Simcoe will be a mayor, and of course it joins the ranks of the restructured county of Oxford and Lambton county, and that's a good thing.

This does not embody the ingredients of establishing a regional government. There are four main ingredients of regional government. The first is to restructure the local municipalities, the second is to reallocate the services from the local to the upper tier, and the third is to change everything the next day when regional government is established, change everything, all systems. We're not seeing that in Simcoe county, and I want to take this opportunity to acknowledge the foresight and the progress that was made by the members of Simcoe county council in coming forth with the changes they have proposed and that are embodied in this bill. The other item is to reallocate the services from the local to the upper tier, and I note that in this case planning is the only service mentioned.

What we have here are restructured local municipalities with a very strong base, in most cases, with the services for the most part left at the local level, and I think it's an excellent step. I wish them well.

Oh, an important feature I didn't mention was the fact that at this point in time, the presently elected members of council will not be evicted from office but will be allowed to work together, in the case of joint municipalities, to prepare for the new term of office at the end of this year.

I thank the members of those municipal councils and county council who have worked so hard to bring forth the ingredients of this bill and wish them well in this step of progress in the great county of Simcoe.

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I'm most anxious to hear from all the members who are in this House representing the county of Simcoe. I believe there are four members who serve Simcoe county, and I'm very anxious to hear their viewpoints on this bill. Thank you for this opportunity.

The Acting Speaker: Questions and comments on Mr Eddy's debate?

Mr Norman W. Sterling (Carleton): The parliamentary assistant left the impression with the House that everything was agreed upon during committee. The fact is that during committee there were certain amendments proposed by the member for Simcoe East, who I think will be our next speaker. I want to tell you that the member for Simcoe East, who has been a successful politician since 1981 in this House, proposed some very reasonable amendments which were turned down by the government of the day. Therefore, I think it's incorrect to portray the committee hearings as being that everything was agreed to in total. I think the member for Simcoe East understands the county of Simcoe best and he understands this bill best, and therefore it's unfortunate that the government did not listen to his reasoned amendments and support them in the committee.

I want to add that the member for Simcoe West as well proposed amendments which were not accepted by this government. Both of those members are going to speak shortly on this bill. It's unfortunate that when we get into situations like this, the government doesn't listen to the MPPs who represent that area and who know best. I really am looking forward to the remarks of both the member for Simcoe East and the member for Simcoe West on this particular piece of legislation.

The Acting Speaker: Further questions and comments? Does the member for Brant-Haldimand wish to use the two minutes for response?

Mr Eddy: I certainly appreciate the comments of the member for Carleton. He's quite correct in what he said. Once again, even though everyone might agree that there's a change that would be appropriate and indeed advantageous, we're prevented from doing that. That's unfortunate.

But I would hope the government would have the good sense and courtesy to follow the progress in the changes in Simcoe county, and if there are some amendments that should be made I hope the government would recognize that and indeed make changes.

Of course there's no need for us to be here debating this bill. If we changed the Municipal Act and allowed the counties to restructure themselves, then we wouldn't be here. It is simply -- I should say the word "simply." It is a restructuring of local municipalities. It is not a major governmental change, other than some amalgamations. I think that's the way it should be.

Mr Allan K. McLean (Simcoe East): The time is certainly long overdue when this Legislature has the opportunity to debate Bill 51, the County of Simcoe Act. There's been a process that has gone on for some years. The process started back in 1988 when -- and I remember that time; I was a member of this House -- they wanted to reform county government.

At that time there was the Tatham report, and they travelled the province, travelled to many areas. Mr Tatham was a member from Oxford, I believe, whose county at that time was restructured back from a city, I believe Woodstock, and that was encompassed within the municipalities. That seemed to work well for that area. Mr Tatham was warden, I understand, for about two terms.

But don't forget: Mr Tatham, an individual, worked with eight members of the Legislature, and it so happens that those eight members were all from one political party. They tried to indicate that this was a committee of the Legislature, which it really wasn't at all. It was a committee of eight Liberals who travelled the province to try to restructure county government.

Well, two years after that report was done, the minister announced that eight municipalities in south Simcoe would be amalgamated into three larger ones. The study committee considering the restructuring of north Simcoe consisted of ministry staff and only a few elected representatives from the municipalities whose future is being considered. That amounted to the virtual disenfranchisement of the residents of those municipalities under consideration. That was some time after that Tatham report was done and the bottom end of the county of Simcoe was looked at.

I remember when the ministry staff arranged a meeting for the city of Barrie and the city of Orillia to meet at Molson's reception area on the highway just out of Barrie, at which the ministry indicated to the two cities that it was going to restructure the other part of the county and wanted the two cities to be part of that restructuring.

I was at that meeting and saw what happened and observed what was taking place. I had indicated in many of my remarks how flawed I thought the system was in terms of being driven from the ministry. A lot of people said that was not the case, but from what I observed it appears to have been the case.

The committee was set up of county council, representation on which was mostly from the south part of the county, which had already been restructured. So we had votes from the south outweighing and dictating what should happen in the north. There were two members plus the warden who were from the new area that they wanted to restructure.

I have never been opposed to county restructuring, but I certainly have been opposed to the process. I said at the time, after the south part of the county was restructured: "There should be a five-year moratorium on north Simcoe. Let's see how it works in the south part of the county. Let's see how the members there can deal with the planning of what's needed."

The real problem was that when they wanted to restructure the county, there should have been a plan done of what they thought should happen. There was no planning, no land use planning. The county never had a plan. How can you determine where the boundaries are going to be when you never had a plan?

It wasn't long after the committee was formed, and three representatives from the city of Barrie and two representatives from the city of Orillia were part of this committee, that it was travelling the north end of the county to determine how restructuring should take place. The terms of reference were that they were to look at the feasibility of doing some restructuring in the north end of the county. But it was within a month that they came out with drawings and lines of where they felt the municipality should be.

In the 1990 election I spoke many times, and there wasn't a speech I made in which I didn't bring to the people's attention what was taking place.

I for one have seen what Darcy McKeough did with regard to regional government. Our county was strongly opposed to any further regional government. You can talk to the member for Muskoka-Georgian Bay about how he feels about regional government. You can talk to anyone who has been involved with regard to Durham, York. You can talk to any region, and you know what's happened.

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I have been opposed to regional government for a long time, but I can tell you, Madam Speaker, that I have never been opposed to looking at restructuring from a commonsense point of view, from a planning point of view that would be better for the county.

When I look at what has happened in our county, the hearings that were held, the times that I attended county council and spoke -- not overwhelmingly receptive because I was not on their agenda -- I don't understand and some members of county council don't understand why there was so much pressure for all this county restructuring. The ones from the south end of the county felt that the north end should be restructured because they were, and that was forced on them by the previous administration by law. There was no choice for them.

Interjection: No debate.

Mr McLean: No debate, and they did it. I have said on many occasions that there's got to be debate and there's got to be questions asked.

There have been boundary changes that some municipalities did not agree to. Most of them agreed but there were some that did not. When I look at some of the debates that we had during the hearings -- Mr Hayes says, "I'm not surprised that Mr McLean's not surprised because I mentioned right from the beginning to some of the first people who came forward that when people talked about having a boundary change, the agreement the county had made was that the municipalities affected would have to agree." That's what Mr Hayes said.

Mr Hayes, I'm here to tell you that the township of Orillia never, ever did agree to the boundary that was placed upon it by the county council. Now what do you say about that?

There are some other municipalities that feel that they have been in the same position. I know what the township of Tiny has gone through and I'd indicated very strongly that the township of Tiny would have to come to an agreement with the town of Midland before -- and I would fight drastically for that township to be able to have its say with regard to the boundary and the amount of assessment that it was losing.

When we look at the overall picture of county restructuring -- and some of the people who will be listening tonight will be saying, "Well, that's maybe not the way we saw it," but there were votes on county council that said, "Yes, we want county restructuring." I have to say to you that probably that was because there are a lot of the people from the south end of the county, which had the most population or most votes, who said that they are going to have county restructuring, and most of the people on the county restructuring committee were from the county.

But when I look at what happened in the election of 1991 -- and we have a sample of the referendums that were held: Orillia township voted 91% against restructuring; Rama township voted 75% against restructuring; Tiny township voted 92% against restructuring; Sunnidale township voted 95% against restructuring; the village of Elmvale voted 85% against restructuring.

There are some people out there who are listening tonight who are criticizing me for my stand with regard to county restructuring. I have to say to those people that I will be with the majority of the people in those municipalities who are telling us what they want. Isn't that democracy, listening to the people?

I have to say that when I read these statistics of the votes that have been held and after that referendum county still proceeded, I believe 43 to 27, to continue with county restructuring -- those people who I say are criticizing me in my stand, the next election you should go to the door and say, "I'm the candidate who is in favour of county restructuring." Say that. Tell the people that's what you want. Don't say that you don't.

In the Eight Mile Point area there are people who went out and got 600 signatures on a petition opposing the boundary change that was made there without the approval of the township of Orillia. What say do those 600 signatures have, what weight did they have, with regard to county restructuring? Who is speaking for those people who put their name on the line and who want to be heard? I say somebody has got to speak for those people.

I can tell you that the municipalities that have tried to make an agreement to make some changes -- we have with us tonight Gary Thiess and the former reeve of the township, Jack Fountain, who has followed this county restructuring through from start to finish. I know Gary has even met with the Premier. He said he's pressed all the buttons, but I said, "Gary, there really wasn't anything on the other side of those buttons when it gets right down to it," because you can see what's happening. You can see that this bill is going to have third reading tonight. At about midnight we'll probably have the Lieutenant Governor here to determine what's going to happen.

There are some other interesting events that happened in 1991, but they also happened in 1990 when we were dealing with an election. The member for Simcoe Centre said, "I would see the proposed restructuring of Simcoe county scrapped. We don't need to become a northern Mississauga. Having Barrie and other urban areas melded with rural municipalities invites too rapid development and obvious loss of farm land and the rural way of life and higher costs for the diminishing services," said Paul Wessenger. Well, what happened? He's voted for the county bill. He's voted to take the rights of the people away. That's right.

Interjections.

The Acting Speaker: Order.

Mr McLean: Well, I've got to tell you further, Madam Speaker -- Paul will have his two minutes, there's no doubt about that -- that the process has been flawed from the start. That has been my greatest theme all the way through this.

The county needs to be looked at. I understand that. But don't we do some planning before we make some boundary changes? Don't we do some planning? No. This was driven from the ministry, and if anybody thinks there's any different from that, I beg to differ with them, because it was driven by the ministry.

The county committee had terms of reference, and it had the cities that were sitting on that committee. Do you know what happened halfway through? The county council said to the two cities: "We don't accept what you're telling us. We want you off the committee."

That's exactly what happened. The representatives from the city of Barrie and the city of Orillia were no longer on the county committee. Well, I guess the city of Barrie and the city of Orillia are within the county of Simcoe, and I would've thought that some planning would've indicated how they would've been part of the overall county. That didn't happen.

On July 23, 1991, the county approved the study. But it wasn't until June 14, 1993, that it received first reading. It's all this year -- August 3, second reading -- and tonight it's going to be the third reading.

The county, I say, has had some concerns with regard to county restructuring. We've had some municipalities that amalgamated and are not overly enthused about it. But I've got to say it is proceeding. I can assure them tonight it'll be law within a few hours. County will be, as of January 1, 1994, a new day.

But the voters said no in about eight of those municipalities, and what did the people do? What did the county do? They proceeded with county restructuring because they had the votes at county council to say that's what they wanted. But the municipalities out there that had the ballot said they didn't want it.

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We look at what happened in the Constitution, we look at what happened with previous governments that don't listen to the people. Only about one or two reeves were returned to office; the others were defeated because of county government. So the process is in place that we've got a county that, as of tonight, is going to be restructured as of January 1.

We look at some of the concerns that have been raised in the township of Tay. The township of Tay has negotiated a deal with the town of Midland and the town of Penetanguishene. This restructuring is taking place, but the township of Tay is keeping jurisdiction of their land for another three years. They are going to collect the taxes, but through this restructuring bill they are going to be restructured. So there is a side deal that's taken place.

My colleague and I had about six amendments that we wanted to put in with regard to second reading of this bill, but as the parliamentary assistant said, there will be no amendments accepted. So the process is my theme, because that is what has been wrong.

The minister indicated we're going to save about $1.3 million; that's going to be the saving to the county. I know of one municipality that's already signed agreements, and they're telling me that it's going to be $126,000 more for administration just for their new municipality. Perhaps somebody should tell me where the costs are going to be. I don't see them and I don't think anybody else does.

Anyhow, there's a lot of history that goes on here. When we look at the letter that I got from Tom Crowe just recently -- Tom is an owner of a golf course at Orr Lake -- Tom wrote a very strong letter indicating that he doesn't like restructuring.

While I'm going through my notes, I see here that "MPP Waters Rips Restructuring." "The MPP who represents Midland at Queen's Park is branding the proposed restructuring of North Simcoe as a ripoff of tax money." That's what the member for Muskoka-Georgian Bay is saying, and he's right. I agree with what he said in Huronia on Sunday, September 20, 1992, just a little over a year ago.

Here's another one. It says, "Waters Blasted for 'Tax Grab'." I don't think Waters is all wrong, and I'll tell you why. He lived in a municipality that was restructured. He lives in the Muskoka-Georgian Bay riding, and he knows what's going to happen when you restructure. He knows what has happened when you're in a region, and that is where the problem comes in.

Here's another Free Press release. It's a very recently dated one. As a matter of fact, it's December 5, 1993. It says:

"A bill intended to make the government of Simcoe county more efficient seems to threaten to do just the opposite.

"Bill 51, which would reduce the number of municipalities from the present 28 to 16, is late being passed by Queen's Park.

"Although it's supposed to go into effect on January 1, it still awaits third reading on the government order paper. That despite the fact the bill has been ready for passage for almost a year, since January 1992."

I've said that the process has been flawed. Here we've had a ministry and a government that had the opportunity in all of 1993 to bring this legislation forward for debate. They didn't allow us time to debate it in August. I believe it was August 3 that it had second reading with no debate. This is the first chance that we've had an opportunity to debate this bill. We had a bit of an opportunity to debate it when we travelled the county to about six municipalities.

But you know, what the people were telling us there is not what I'm hearing with regard to some of the problems that are in that bill. I know that in one instance, there were some 55 who made presentations who were municipal people. Why did the municipal people want to make presentations? I thought this was really for the ordinary person out there who was opposed to it. I know somewhere in my notes, I believe, there were about 28 who were in favour of it. I have to tell you, there's a problem with regard to this whole process, and that's what my debate has been on.

As I said at the start, let's see how the south end of the county works. If it works, fine; then we proceed with a plan on the north and, after that, then we proceed with restructuring. I have a feeling that I was on the right track and I'm here tonight to say that this bill is going to be law.

We still have a problem in Tiny township. There have been environmental hearings going on with regard to a garbage site that is wanted by the urban areas, against the wishes of the township of Tiny, on class 1 farm land. Bill 51 is going to change what happens with regard to waste disposal in the county of Simcoe, because this bill will allow the county to transfer garbage to any one of the sites that it has.

I don't think there is a need for another disposal site in the county of Simcoe. They have 17 now and I don't think there is a need for another one on class 1 farm land. There's got to be a better way.

Robert Eison wants to move the hearings from Tiny township to Toronto. He's the chairman of the Environmental Assessment Board hearings up there. I don't accept that. Hearings, in my estimation, were supposed to have been held in the community that was affected.

I believe there are better ways to deal with the disposal of waste in the county of Simcoe. This plan, Bill 51, gives the county the right to dictate where that should go. I believe the time has come when we've got to get to waste management such as rail haul and waste to energy.

I myself made some presentations to the committee when it was having hearings. At that time, I expressed my concerns for the process. I have always maintained that it has been flawed. I've never said that there shouldn't be restructuring in the county of Simcoe, but I said the way it has been done has not been right.

We have some clippings that say:

"Restructuring a Chance to Stop a Runaway Train.

"No one disputes the fact that all of our municipal taxes will go up as a result of being restructured. Money spent so far on the restructuring process is a small drop in the bucket when compared to the enormous costs we face in the future. The government of the province of Ontario will not proceed with restructuring if there is a consensus against it. There has been no consensus against it. The county council voted in favour of it. They said that we should go ahead. Some of the reeves have said, 'If we don't do it, the province will.' The province, during the hearing, said, 'We will not do it. It's you that wants it, it's you that's going to vote for it, and if you want it, we will do it.'"

I have some problems with that, because I still do believe that it was driven by the ministry.

Headlines in the paper: "County Restructuring Still Under Fire" and "Stop Now Before It's Too Late." That came from Frank Hamilton of Glen Huron. He's in the riding of my colleague, who will probably speak about that in his remarks.

I found the letter to Mr Philip from Tom Crowe that I was looking for. It says:

"We do not want it. Nobody knows what it is. We were asked in a written survey and it was rejected. We are in Medonte township and everything seems to be all right now, so why change it? Bigger is not better, and if you don't believe me, look at education. Members of Medonte council told me they do not want to change even though they voted for it, and the clerk's office does not want to change. We feel that our taxes will rise when we cannot afford to pay our taxes now. Please, it is not too late to stop restructuring. Please do not pass the bill."

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I think probably the bottom line is that it is too late to stop restructuring. I think the train has gone past. I think the work that has been done by the county has been done based on what it has been told and what it has anticipated is going to happen. I still think the process has been flawed. It wasn't too long ago that "City Taking Forest Home" was in the paper on December 7. "The township of Orillia has passed a bylaw with the city of Orillia to have that part of the municipality that was going to the township of Oro in this deal put back in the city of Orillia." The city of Orillia has a plan that it had put on -- it has done its planning and it was approved this year by the minister -- that says that a section of Forest Home, Eight Mile Point area, which would appear should be in the city of Orillia will be. That is not what we're passing here tonight. We're passing something different than what they had said.

There was a lot of discussion in the south end of the county with regard to the problems that they have had. "Three towns of south Simcoe will receive a total of $855,244 in special assistance grants from the province, Municipal Affairs Minister Ed Philip said today." We have not heard of any figures that are going to be assessed or released to the county of Simcoe, northern part. We understand there have been costs that have been released to the county to help pay the municipalities for the work they have done and what was needed to be done to make it happen. It's January 1. Little time is left. I can tell you, it can show you how the taxes will increase in the county of Simcoe after this.

Didn't previous governments show us what restructuring was all about, and regional government? Have we not learned from that lesson? Have we not realized that if you haven't got consensus from the municipalities, it's not going to be right, it's not going to be proper? They're closing the Municipal Affairs office in the city of Orillia. The minister says what he's going to do is he's going to have the office at the county building in Barrie now so it'll be convenient. But, you know, what's happened is the fact is that they have to pay the rent there for the next three years, at $41,000 a year. They're closing the office; it's still sitting there. They're going now to the county building to rent space there to fulfil the need that is there because of restructuring. If you talk about a ministry that is in trouble, I say to Ed -- you're listening there now; I can tell that -- you maybe should think again, because that's not the way tat I would run a business.

My colleague the member for Markham, who has property in Tiny township, is not going to speak on this bill because we thought that I could make a few remarks on his behalf. Also, we have the member for Willowdale, Mr Harnick, who also has property in that area. I don't know why, but it's a great part of the province to be able to have a holiday in.

Mr Cousens says:

"The restructuring process for Simcoe county has been flawed right from the beginning. How wrong it is that one community should benefit at the expense of another. The fact is that Tiny township is giving up significant revenue and residents feel they have been short-changed illustrates the unfairness of this bill.

"Having attended meetings with municipal politicians, there was a genuine desire for equality. There's no long-term equality for Tiny township with this bill. The discussions among the community should continue and the government should take the necessary time to develop a solution that will be fair to all parties.

"I deeply regret the government's reluctance to continue the debate to ensure a fair settlement of all parties."

I said at the beginning -- and I will close my remarks -- that county restructuring has been a process that I believe had a major flaw. The major flaw has been the fact that there was no planning done to indicate where any boundaries should be. The ministry dictated what it felt under the old Toronto-centred region plan -- probably very few members here realize what that old plan was -- which is probably what the boundaries were drawn on. They got the people from the south end of the county, most of them on the committee, who make the recommendations. Bill 51 will pass tonight. I hope that what will happen in the county of Simcoe is that we will think positively, that it will be a plus, although I have been against the process and opposed to it.

There's a little history here that I'd like to put on the record. The wife of John Graves Simcoe, the founder of this great province, had three dogs: Tiny, Tay and Flos. That history, as of tonight, will no longer be there, because there will be no more Flos and there will be no more Tay as we had known them. Tiny will still be there, but I'm telling you, this government is killing history in this province.

The bottom line: I want to thank all those people who participated in the public hearings. I want to thank all those people who have come to visit with us and the time they have taken to try and convince people of what they feel was wrong with this piece of legislation. I hope -- and I'm an old county councillor and an ex-warden of the county -- that after this bill is passed, our new attitude will be, "We've got to make it work," because we've got to think positive. Much as I oppose the process, I say that I will work with those people to make it work and I say to you tonight that Simcoe county is changed for ever. I want to thank you for the opportunity to have these remarks.

Mr Charles Harnick (Willowdale): I come to know a little bit about this bill because I know a number of people who live in Tiny township and I know what this bill is going to do to them over the next 10-year phase-in period. I know that friends of mine, Bill Desroches, Paul Marion, Don Dorion and Gerard Lafrenière, who all live in the Lafontaine area, are people who work very hard for the dollars they put on their tables to look after their families and to run their farms.

I can tell you that when this bill is passed and the commercial base of Tiny township is taken away and there's a 10-year phase-in period so that Tiny township can die a slow death over 10 years, these people are going to be hurt. They're going to be hurt because their taxes are going to have to go up to pay for schools, for roads, waste disposal and all of the other municipal services that we in urban areas tend to take for granted.

What is going to happen is that these people are going to see their taxes go up dramatically, because this restructuring bill takes the commercial base of Tiny township right out of the township; there is no commercial base left. I know the member for Simcoe East is well aware that this commercial base runs along Highway 93 and is now part of the annexation into the Midland town area. My friends in Lafontaine are going to be hurt.

I take some comfort in the fact that although I don't know an awful lot about this restructuring bill, the member for Simcoe East is firmly against this bill. He's against it because 92% of those people in Tiny township whom he represents were against this bill and the government didn't listen. They just went ahead and they did it anyway. I'm opposed to this bill as well.

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Mr Daniel Waters (Muskoka-Georgian Bay): My colleague from Simcoe East is more than right about some of the press clippings. In fact, he was being kind because there are some other ones that were much more colourful, in the early days of this bill, about my remarks and my feeling about restructuring. I can tell you, though, that as the time progressed, a number of those concerns were dealt with by the county and by Municipal Affairs and they came up with agreements that seemed to work, and I believe they can work.

Last April, I believe it was, Jack Hunter from Tay township put forward a vote in which, if you had taken the south out of it, it still would have passed. I am told by people such as Nancy Keefe, who was warden, I believe, at the time, a year ago, that the province did not pressure Simcoe county into restructuring, that it was driven by the county. She was, I believe, the warden at the time and therefore I trust her to be a very honourable person; no reason to tell me that the county did not want this.

I'd like to end with something: I was in Matchedash on Sunday. It was a very tough day. We had a wake, basically, for the township of Matchedash and I think we all came to the consensus that this can work, but it's the people of the county of Simcoe who have to make it work. Otherwise, it will be like other restructuring or other district government that indeed costs more and you get less. But if the people make it work and they work with their local councillors, this reduction from 28 to 16 can work and can be cost-efficient for the county.

The Acting Speaker (Ms Margaret H. Harrington): Any other questions or comments? Seeing none, the member for Simcoe East has two minutes to respond.

Mr McLean: I want to take the opportunity to respond to my colleague the member for Willowdale, who mentioned with regard to Tiny, and yes, I remember attending meetings in the Tiny township municipal office with regard to county restructuring. At that time, they were not talking to the town of Midland, and I'd indicated very strongly that there would be no support for this bill unless there was an agreement made with regard to that highway strip and Tay township got reimbursed for what it was losing.

I think that was important at the time because it made them come together and deal with that very issue. Tiny township is very happy now. I understand that Midland and Penetanguishene mostly have come to an agreement with regard to part of Tay. I think it is important that this has happened. They're working together and I think that's great.

The member Mr Waters had indicated with regard to the problem that Jack Hunter, the reeve of Tay township, had brought to his attention. Victoria Harbour and Port McNicoll: Many people had thought in the past that this should be all part of one municipality and I think it will work out.

Now that we know the bill is passing, there's no two ways about it, we have to take the positive attitude to make the county of Simcoe the great county that it has been for years. I want to be part of that system that will continue to say that Simcoe county is great. I certainly know and I sympathize with those people who have put in those hours and hours of work to try to make it better, to try and get the changes that they felt were right for their municipality. I sympathize with the township of Orillia, which never did agree to county restructuring. The boundary line was never agreed to by them. They are part of it.

I think the process has been flawed. I will continue to say that. But we've got it now, so let's make the best of it.

Mr Jim Wilson (Simcoe West): As there was no second reading debate on Bill 51, An Act respecting the restructuring of the County of Simcoe, I am pleased to have this opportunity to deliver remarks on legislation that will have a tremendous impact on my constituents in the riding of Simcoe West.

Before beginning, I feel it's important to get on the record that both my colleague from Simcoe East, who spoke so eloquently in the past few minutes, and I have gone out of our way to assist the government in bringing this legislation forward, as a courtesy to Simcoe county council. I want to state for the record that we gave up our right to debate on this bill on second reading so that we could force the government to hold four days of public hearings in the county this past summer. So we've not had any debate to this point in this Legislature and at this level of government.

Having said that, I will be voting against Bill 51 on third reading because I believe the restructuring process in Simcoe county has been flawed from the beginning, that the negatives of restructuring far outweigh the positives, and that the will of the people has been denied in my riding of Simcoe West. Nothing in Bill 51 has changed my belief that restructuring is a poor prescription for the people of Simcoe county.

I want to speak about the flawed process that the member for Simcoe East alluded to so wonderfully in his remarks, and a bit of the background.

Regional government should have died a natural death in 1975, but the idea was reincarnated in the 1980s under the Liberals and cleverly termed "restructuring."

The first two-tier metropolitan government in Ontario was formed in 1954 in Metropolitan Toronto. It was superimposed over 13 area municipalities in the southern portion of York county. At that time it was thought to be a onetime wonder. However, between 1969 and 1974, the Ontario government created regional governments in Ottawa-Carleton, Niagara, York, Waterloo, Sudbury, Peel, Halton, Hamilton-Wentworth, Durham and Haldimand-Norfolk. No new regional governments were created after 1974 by the then PC government of Ontario because of the political backlash that resulted from the first batch of regional governments. The Ontario PC Party stopped introducing regional governments in 1975, as a matter of historical record.

After the concept of regional government had been announced by the public, Ontario returned to a traditional approach of adapting local governments to growth pressures through annexation and amalgamation. Boundary adjustments were facilitated with the passing of the Municipal Boundary Negotiations Act in 1981. As well, a major revision of the Planning Act in 1983 delegated planning responsibilities to county governments.

In the late 1980s, the Liberals decided to take another crack at reforming county government by carrying out three major studies. They were entitled Patterns for the Future, the report of the Advisory Committee on County Government, 1987; County Government in Ontario, 1989; and the final study, Toward an Ideal County: Principles and Programs for a Strong County Government System in Ontario, 1990.

The 1989 County Government in Ontario, or the Tatham, report was assembled by a consultation committee that toured the province and reported back to the Minister of Municipal Affairs. Interestingly enough, this committee was comprised of nine members of provincial Parliament, all of whom were members of the governing Liberal caucus. This committee made 41 recommendations which underpinned the principle of strengthening county government. Of course, implicit in the notion of strengthening county government is the reality that municipalities are sacrificed in the process.

The final Liberal caucus report into reforming county government, called Toward an Ideal County, merely reinforced the ideas contained in the two previous reports, reports which intended to produce a desired effect which would strengthen county government or regional government. This is what I call the external flaw that underpins the restructuring of Simcoe county.

The Liberals knew the extent of the hatred that Ontarians held for regional government. In order to circumvent the will of the people, they stacked the consultation committee in order to achieve a false consensus on the so-called virtues of strengthened county government.

Confronted by three flawed Liberal government reports in which each called for strengthened county governments, Simcoe county council embarked upon the slippery slope of restructuring in 1989. Simcoe county councillors believed that to do nothing would serve as an invitation for the provincial Liberal government to restructure the county the way the provincial bureaucrats had wanted to do all along.

As a consequence, they felt it more prudent to carry out their own study and keep the province out of Simcoe county's affairs. This was a noble attitude at the time because when the government is involved in anything, it invariably messes it up. However, this fateful decision by county council became a tragedy of Shakespearean proportions for the people of Simcoe county.

When the Liberals paid dearly for their arrogance at the polls in 1990, the NDP came along, driven by the same restructuring-happy bureaucrats at Municipal Affairs, and told the county to complete the study it had begun under the Liberal regime. The county had become imprisoned by its own initiative, which the NDP used to its advantage by terming the Simcoe county study a "locally driven initiative."

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This brings us to the second flaw. This flaw was articulated best by my constituent, Mr McFarlane, of Glen Huron, who said: "Amalgamations such as that proposed are highly suspect. They are driven by interests other than those of the rural community."

In Simcoe county, restructuring was driven by self-interested municipalities. Midland, Collingwood and Stayner wanted these changes to acquire more land assessment and a larger tax base. The four townships bordering the city of Barrie supported restructuring in order to hold off the city's expansion plans. Municipalities in south Simcoe supported the changes because they had already been forced to restructure or amalgamate in 1990 under the previous Liberal government.

That bill went through this House as one of the last pieces of legislation before Mr Peterson called the snap election in 1990. It went through this House with no debate -- no debate whatsoever. My constituents have had to suffer the consequences ever since.

The composition of the Simcoe county restructuring committee reinforces my point about the interests of a few dictating the future of the many. Five of the nine committee members came from south Simcoe, which was told that it would have to amalgamate before the study began. There was no way they could be objective on the issue of restructuring. They had already been forced to restructure and their attitude, I think, was, "Well, we've been forced in the south end; it's time the north end got restructured."

Two other committee members came from municipalities searching for additional land and assessment. Another committee member came from a township bordering the city of Barrie.

In other words, the county committee was structured to produce a desired end result. Eight of the nine members were representing interests other than those interests that should override all others, and they are the best interests of the majority of the people in Simcoe county.

I want to speak about some of the negatives to restructuring. The negatives to restructuring far outweigh the positives.

The first negative is the loss of local identity. Local communities fear a loss of identity and they fear being wiped off the map. There is also potential for their distinctiveness and their historic character to become absorbed by larger communities.

I was angered and frustrated that during the four days we spent in public hearings in the county of Simcoe this summer, the map that was given to presenters and that was in the room during those days no longer contained any reference to the township of Sunnidale or the township of Nottawasaga. The bureaucrats at Municipal Affairs in this government had already wiped those names off the map before this bill was even passed, because those two townships are being amalgamated with Creemore and Stayner to form the new amalgamated township of Clearview.

I was insulted, and the people who appeared before that committee who said they feared losing local identity merely had to look at the map on the wall, which was the government's reference map, which already had wiped their names off the map of the county of Simcoe.

The number two negative is accessibility. In larger regional municipalities, citizens lose access to elected officials. Regional governments are seen as remote and bureaucratic.

Three is the taxation levels. Amalgamations or regional government consolidations produce higher levels of taxation for residents who reside in rural areas. In the early stages of regional governments, there was a substantial increase in tax rates from the previous non-consolidated municipal rates. This government -- or any government -- can't point to any regional government that worked out to be a better deal for the taxpayers of Ontario.

I know of what I speak. My party did the regional governments prior to 1975 and we got out of the business because the people of Ontario did not want it.

The cost to build a possible new municipal office for the soon-to-be-amalgamated township of Clearview could run as high as $1.2 million. Officials from Clearview are bracing the public for the worst in terms of their tax bills for the soon-to-be-formed township. The administrator was quoted in a recent newspaper article as saying: "Hopefully, you're not going to get hit too hard. I would hope the total tax bill...should not be a great deal more than what it is for the four municipalities at this time."

The following is a quote from a paper undertaken by the Ministry of Treasury and Economics in 1976 entitled Regional Government in Perspective: A Financial Review:

"It was intended that property taxes not contributing directly for services such as police and intermunicipal roads would experience increases while those that had contributed fully would experience decreases. The increases became greater with the effects of inflation and expansion of services while the decreases were practically eliminated." This is the government's own study, talking about the effect on taxation in regional governments.

The regional municipality of Cambridge was formed in 1973. Between 1972 and 1975, all municipalities in this new regional municipality experienced tax increases, but the burden was heaviest in the rural municipalities. The city of Galt had a 26.3% increase over that time. The township of North Dumfries had an 85.5% increase over that time. The township of Waterloo had a 71.1% increase. Bigger is not better; it's simply more expensive.

Number 4 on the negative side is the process. Amalgamations are often done so quickly that a proper impact study of cost and taxation is not carried out before public hearings begin. Simcoe county residents still do not know what the cost and tax implications will be of this restructuring.

Five is the loss of autonomy. Residents in rural areas end up paying more in taxes to pay for services they don't always want but are forced to have. They are not given a choice as to what services they want to pay more for.

The sixth negative to restructuring is its unpopularity. Regardless of their merits, the people of Ontario view regional governments in a completely negative light. In 1989 the provincial government received numerous complaints about regional government during its review of these types of governments in Ottawa-Carleton, Haldimand-Norfolk and Niagara. Common complaints included -- and I quote from the government's own paper called Working with Regional Government: Development Issues. It was produced by Insight Press in 1989. Those quotes are:

"Regional government is a money-wasting empire of overpaid, underworked bureaucrats and politicians."

Citizen taxpayers "should not be saddled with such a money-guzzling, useless form of an octopus that is robbing us blind."

Other comments: "Disband regional government; it is too expensive."

"Scrap regional government and return to the system in place prior to regional government."

"Regional government creates a duplication of services, does not communicate with taxpayers and generally wastes more money."

The seventh negative to restructuring is again its expense and the expense of setting up this new government. The costs to carry out studies and implement regional or restructured government are high. In addition, and to comfort the municipalities that are forced to undergo these restructurings, the government must provide grants to ease the transitional expenses in the wake of consolidation.

The only reason the people of New Tecumseth in my riding who were forced to restructure under the Liberals have not at this point seen a significant tax increase due to restructuring is because we funnelled some $4.8 million to that municipality to cushion the effect. Well, I tell you, in 1995, when the police grants run out, there's going to be a huge bill sent to the taxpayers of New Tecumseth. At the same time, in the restructuring in the north end, the government's spending less than $2 million to cushion the effects of the transitional activities that have taken place to date. That's not nearly enough money to cover many of the costs that the municipalities have already incurred. The government has told us there'll be no more money for restructuring. Tax bills will go up.

I think the eighth negative is downloading. I learned this first hand when I was elected in 1990 after restructuring had taken place in New Tecumseth. I had people like the recreational people at New Tecumseth coming to me and saying: "Mr Wilson, in the past we used to get three or four arena grants to fix the roofs of our arenas. Now we just get one. What's happened?" I said: "Well, you've been restructured. On the map at Municipal Affairs, you're no longer Beeton, Tottenham, Tecumseth township and Alliston. You are New Tecumseth. You get one grant. You figure out what arena you're supposed to fix up."

When it came to the Environmental Youth Corps program, we used to get two students for each of those municipalities. Now we're one municipality. We get two students for the four former municipalities.

It goes on and on and on, and I've already talked about the cost of policing. Restructuring is nothing but a form of downloading, driven by bureaucrats here and bought into by two successive governments. It's nothing but that.

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Rather than talking in an upfront way about paying for OPP services that currently the province pays for in my rural municipalities, rather than taking that issue head-on as a separate issue, they sneak it in through the back door and they download the cost of police services in the case of new Tecumseth. They do give a phase-in period of five years, but I'll tell you, in 1995 we'll be responsible for 100% of policing, and five years previous to that the province paid for policing in the rural areas of New Tecumseth. It's nothing but downloading, and it's an underhanded way to treat the people of the province of Ontario.

Unfortunately for my constituents -- I want to talk about some alternatives to restructuring -- and for other residents of Simcoe county, both the Liberals and NDP failed to adequately explore other options than the draconian proposal to restructure Ontario's largest county.

These other options include such things as:

-- Intermunicipal agreements or agencies which are used to provide regional planning or regional services. These arrangements are usually better and serve to negate the economies of scale and regional planning arguments as a rationale for consolidation;

-- Revenue-sharing between municipalities and the pursuit of equity for services;

-- Disentanglement: Having the province assume some services that it can best deliver, disentangling other services and allowing the local governments to better administer and deliver those services;

-- Community sub-units: These arrangements give identity and different service levels to a part of a municipality that may desire annexation to a neighbouring municipality or separate incorporation. This arrangement is flexible and prevents a situation where the baby is thrown out to save the bath water.

Other arrangements: One is to enhance the status quo. In his 1991 article entitled "Local Government Reorganization in Canada since 1975," author Andrew Sancton, who's the director of the local government program at the department of political science at the University of Western Ontario, believes the more "flexible and adaptable structural arrangements" achieved in Quebec, BC and Alberta are a more viable option than county restructuring in Ontario.

Professor Sancton writes: "After all, the parts of southern Ontario still encompassed by traditional counties bear much more resemblance to the urban areas of these less populous provinces than they do to the almost continuous urban sprawl of the Golden Horseshoe, which two decades ago experienced its own version of county restructuring when regional governments were originally established."

Professor Sancton believes the challenge is not to invent more structural alternatives but to determine in a vigorous manner which municipal structures are working and which ones are not. The best structure is one that is flexible and responsive to the differing needs of city, suburb and countryside.

Sancton believes that no municipal arrangement is perfect. However, the traditional municipal system in Canada -- in which city and countryside are kept separate -- has inherent flexibility in that both sides recognize the inevitability of occasional annexations of rural land to the city for the purposes of new urban development.

Referendum: Professor Sancton also notes that never has a single municipal reorganization plan been submitted in Ontario to a public, binding referendum. However, in the United States such a procedure is normally a state constitutional requirement. As a result, seldom have any proposed reorganization plans been approved south of the border.

In British Columbia annexations or amalgamations need to be supported by a local vote. The Minister of Municipal Affairs has the authority to call a referendum to resolve questions surrounding annexations.

Two years ago, I brought in a private member's bill to ensure that municipalities could not be restructured against their will, not opposing restructuring but opposing forcing restructuring on people who don't want it.

One of the recommendations made by the Ministry of Municipal Affairs' Ottawa-Carleton Regional Review Commission in 1992 was that a referendum be held in Ottawa and Vanier to determine whether those two municipalities should be amalgamated.

Bill 77, An Act to amend certain Acts related to The Regional Municipality of Ottawa-Carleton, which was given first reading on July 22, 1993, does not contain any provisions to hold this referendum, nor does Bill 51, the subject of tonight.

Lessons from restructuring in Simcoe county:

In the future I believe the government should hold a referendum in each affected municipality before carrying out amalgamations. If the government is genuinely interested in restructuring and genuinely interested in that process being locally driven, then they should ask the people whether they actually want it before changes are undertaken.

The government should be asked to produce its studies, if they exist, that determine the costs, impacts and benefits on local ratepayers under a restructured county.

Guarantees should be put in place to ensure that rural taxpayers do not bear the brunt of both taxes and absorbing the accumulated debts in urban areas.

The government should establish an independent review a short time after restructuring is implemented to determine whether these reforms are worth continuing. There should be extensive polling of residents to see whether they support a continued restructured county.

In Simcoe county, democracy was denied. Restructuring has been a four-year exercise carried out by a few to deny the rights and aspirations of the majority of citizens in Simcoe county. In my three years as the member of provincial Parliament for Simcoe West, I have only received one letter out of hundreds from a citizen supporting the idea of restructuring.

Perhaps the sentiment of the masses is best described by Carol Currie, the reeve of Nottawasaga township, who presided over the last council meeting in the township earlier this month. She described the meeting as "a sad, sad day. We had hoped that this day would never happen."

I would caution the government about the wrath of restructuring, because the people will have the final word on this issue. For example, in 1975 my party lost several by-elections and was reduced to minority government status primarily because of the establishment of regional governments. However, we learned from our mistakes. In the 1990 election with the spectre of restructuring Simcoe county, the Liberals were brought to their knees and did not win one seat in the county. Every seat in Simcoe county was won by politicians who campaigned against restructuring. Over the past three years, though, some NDP members -- and they've been named this evening -- have wavered from their original promise to their constituents.

In the last municipal elections in 1991, my constituents overwhelmingly voiced their displeasure with restructuring. Two municipalities in my riding put the issue of restructuring to the true test of democracy. They put the question on their election ballots. Ninety-four percent of voters in Sunnidale township said no to restructuring, as did 85% of the residents in Nottawasaga township. So much for the government's argument about locally driven initiative. Several municipal politicians who supported restructuring fared rather poorly at the polls in the last municipal elections.

Some comments on this legislation, as I wind up, from my constituents and from the people who will be affected by this bill's provisions. Their comments are important because they were largely ignored at public meetings concerning this issue.

Harry H. Powell from Perkinsfield wrote me to point out that: "At the November 1991 municipal elections, 7,100 Tiny township voters turned out to vote. On an accompanying ballot, 5,090 voted against restructuring. This should indicate a travesty of justice," he writes.

Dr Robert R. Kutcy of Nottawasaga township writes: "If in the restructuring we are promised extra services, such as town water and sewer, I would gladly reconsider the whole situation. At present, the only thing I can see that the proposal would offer would be significantly higher taxes, without increase in any services."

Frank Hamilton from Glen Huron faxed me last month, saying, "Our province, our country, our compensation board, our UIC fund, our government pensions, etc are all on the verge of financial collapse, and yet restructuring is being put together even though it's going to cost us more money to run."

Lynda Jeffrey, a Stayner resident, succinctly summarized her opposition to Bill 51 in a letter. She writes, "Large numbers of people are opposed to restructuring because of three main reasons -- higher taxes, loss of representation from our communities, and the imposition of regional government, which has only proved itself to be far more expensive and far less effective."

Ross Hastings, reeve of the township of Tiny and current warden of the county of Simcoe, wrote in August of this year to the social development committee studying this legislation. Mr Hastings said, "The council feels" -- this is from Tiny -- "that the restructuring of Simcoe county has been a long, antagonistic process without adequate analysis of the financial impacts."

Donald and Betty Scott from Collingwood wrote to me to say, "We hope that our members of government will finally listen to the people because we are still saying 'No to restructuring!'"

Rose and John Danko from New Lowell wrote two years ago to me, saying: "We want to preserve our rural way of life -- this is extremely important to us. And we want to have decisions made at a local level, not by someone who does not have to live with the results of those decisions."

Gail Barrie, a Tiny township councillor, wrote in August, 1993 with respect to the government's handling of this legislation. She said, "Politicians should not ponder why there is such an absence of trust in them from their taxpayers."

Alvin Currie from Collingwood wrote to me and said, "I strongly recommend that Bill 51 be shelved for the time being because of the financial impact upon Simcoe county residents, especially those from the Collingwood-Nottawasaga expropriation area and the Nottawasaga, Sunnidale, Creemore and Stayner amalgamation."

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Harold A. Norris, a sixth-generation resident of Creemore, wrote to me, "I very strongly oppose regional government, having seen taxes rise every time this type of government has been forced on the taxpayer."

D.R. Matthews, the president of D.R. Matthews and Associates of Duntroon, says: "We are very disenchanted with the process in light of the NDP's promise that they would listen to the people/voters. We want to suspend this process and return to us our democratic rights."

Mr and Mrs Wesley Caughill of Nottawasaga township said: "We are also concerned for some of our neighbours who are retired and on fixed incomes. They will find the significant tax increases difficult to handle. It does not seem fair that we purchased land in Nottawasaga township to avoid high town taxes, yet may be forced to become taxpayers of Collingwood anyway. Why should we finance the debts of Collingwood and benefits we may never receive?"

Wendy Ward-Price, who owns property in Nottawasaga township, wrote to the Premier and said, "As a taxpayer in Ontario, I was absolutely horrified to learn that I have virtually no say in my own destiny thanks to your government and the county of Simcoe."

The restructuring of Simcoe county further emphasizes, and emphasizes for all of us, why the public is fed up with governments and politicians: because governments and politicians say one thing in election campaigns -- Premier Rae was in the county of Simcoe in the 1990 provincial election and he said that he would never force a municipality to restructure against its will.

Paul Wessenger, the member for Simcoe Centre, very clearly was opposed to restructuring in the last provincial election. In fact, he went so far as to say that he would scrap the process should he be elected. Well, Mr Wessenger, you're elected. You're here tonight. What do you have to say for yourself? What do you have to say to those constituents? You don't have a mandate to restructure Simcoe county. I don't have a mandate to restructure Simcoe county. The process was flawed from the beginning. The government should scrap this bill. It should listen to the people of the county of Simcoe and it should never have gotten into this flawed process in the beginning, which has really encompassed two governments, and both have failed to listen to the people.

Why don't you learn from the mistakes of the past? Why don't you learn from my party that has commissioned studies after regional government to show that it's not the way to go? Why don't you stop pretending that this isn't regional government, that it's simply restructuring? Why don't you do your downloading in a more upfront way? Why don't you talk to the people? Why don't you ask them what they want? When people hold referendums and you have 85% and 94% opposing something, you're supposed to listen to them. That's what the people want. You're not supposed to go home on weekends and lecture to them about what's good for them.

I reflect on the words of Carol Currie, the reeve of the township of Nottawasaga, in my concluding comments, who said it was indeed a sad, sad day during the final moments of that last council meeting in the township of Nottawasaga. And now we see the map of the county of Simcoe, which doesn't have the township of Nottawasaga on it or the township of Sunnidale or many, many other places, because this government with one stroke of the pen has decided to cancel the wonderful history and tradition that we've enjoyed in Simcoe county. It's a sad, sad day for this government and for all members of the Ontario Legislature with the passage of this legislation.

The Acting Speaker: Questions or comments to the member?

Mr Paul Wessenger (Simcoe Centre): First of all, I'd like to compliment the county of Simcoe for proceeding with restructuring. In all the history of Ontario, I believe this is only the second county that's agreed to restructure and has been restructured, the first being Oxford and Simcoe being the second. I think restructuring is a very difficult political process and I think those who lead restructuring deserve our compliments for their leadership because it does have a great deal of political unpopularity in doing it.

I, for one, believe it's necessary to restructure local government. I think that many of our counties are not viable, many of our municipalities are not viable, and I believe what the county of Simcoe has come up with may not be perfect but is a great improvement.

First of all, it creates planning for the whole county of Simcoe. My major concern politically has always been my concern about all of Simcoe being urbanized, particularly all of south Simcoe being urbanized. I believe establishing planning and an official plan for the county will prevent that urbanization, will preserve the rural character of the county. So it's good for that reason alone.

Secondly, I think it's important to have more viable municipalities that can provide more of the services to their residents that they need.

Thirdly, I think it's very important that we have some cost savings. The estimates are that there will be cost savings as a result of this restructuring.

Lastly, I'd like to say that comparing restructured counties with regional government is fighting a straw man, for the simple reason that regional government is creating a new level of government. Here we have an existing level of government. There's not a creation of any new bureaucracy. It's establishing the existing level of government. Secondly, regional government involves the establishment of new services. With a restructured county, and this one particularly, there are no new services other than planning being established at the county level. In fact, library services are being transferred from the county level down to local municipalities.

So it's really a very good, economical planning process and I'm very pleased to see this go into law this evening.

Mr McLean: I wish to comment briefly on the member for Simcoe West's comments. I want to indicate that the discussion he had with regard to the police boundaries is a major issue that a lot of people have not talked about.

It was interesting to hear the remarks of the member for Simcoe Centre. Why didn't he talk like he's talking now with regard to what he said during the campaign? He's referring to what this member has been talking about: that he agrees with the process, he agrees with restructuring, he thinks it's such a great thing. It's amazing what difference a few years can make. I don't quite understand how a member can at one time oppose restructuring and come in here and say how he is in favour of it. I guess that's a proper thing to do now, because we all know that restructuring is taking place. It's done; it's a done deal. It's the third reading, and there will be no further debate after Mr Wilson is done speaking.

The issue with regard to the votes that were held in the municipalities: Does that not account for anything any more? Is there any point in having anything put on a ballot in a local municipality when they vote 92%, 95%, 85%, 75% against something and the government proceeds, the county proceeds? Is this democracy?

I say to those people who think it's right, when the next election comes around and they're going to the door, they should say: "I supported county restructuring. I think it's the right thing. I think it's the best thing that could happen, and you should vote for me." To you people who criticize us, say that at the door.

The Acting Speaker: Any other questions or comments? Seeing none, the member for Simcoe West has two minutes to respond.

Mr Jim Wilson: I want to thank my colleague the member for Simcoe East, who once again very succinctly in his two minutes really talked about the essence of democracy and that if we're ever going to get governments back on track and get the people to once again believe in politicians and to believe in our democratic process, we have to stop having people running around saying one thing, not just in a light way but in a very forceful way, during a campaign, and then turning around when they're in office and doing the exact opposite. I can't say it any clearer than that.

I say to the member for Simcoe Centre that every one of the cost savings projected by the Municipal Affairs-appointed fact-finder was deemed to come into effect many years down the road, and unless he's prepared to stand in his place and tell the reeves and the municipal clerks, who shot bullets and bazooka studs through every one of those projected savings that the government's fact-finder said would occur -- when we had public hearings, people who are at the grass roots, who are actually delivering the local services, who know what new equipment has to be bought, what new services have to be extended into amalgamated areas, told us that the fact-finding discovery presented by the Ministry of Municipal Affairs was a bunch of bunk and that there would be no cost savings.

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The only cost saving in this process is to the government of Ontario. The only one that benefits in this process is Treasurer Floyd Laughren, because once again, through the back door, through the auspiciousness of setting up a restructured government, through the pretend falsehood that bigger is better, this government is downloading its costs on to the municipality. For the world of me, to the day I go to my grave I'll never understand why this county council bought into a process that would cost their taxpayers more money in the long run.

The Acting Speaker: Further debate? Seeing none, the parliamentary assistant.

Mr Hayes: In the essence of cooperation and a spirit of saving time in this House, I will be very, very brief.

I'd like to thank the members for Simcoe East and Simcoe West for their emotional speeches here this evening, and also the members for Muskoka-Georgian Bay and Simcoe Centre.

I just want to say a few words here about how the members have confused regional government with a restructuring government, and that is indeed what they have done here.

Interjections.

The Acting Speaker: Order.

Mr Hayes: I had the decency to listen to them over there, and I think they should extend that in return.

The bottom line of this thing is that in the early 1970s, the provincial government at that time, the Conservative government, was pushing very hard for regional government. I was a member on county council in Essex county and we defeated regional government in that county. We defeated it because the county councillors voted against it; that's how it was defeated.

We're being accused here of this piece of legislation being bureaucratically driven, being provincially driven. As a matter of fact, that is bunk, because it is driven by the local people in the county, the duly elected members of that county council. It was their wish to have the county council restructured to streamline and to make a more efficient county. This government has not gone in there and dictated to that county. This government has gone in there and carried out the wishes of the duly elected people in that county, the county of Simcoe.

I'd just like to thank everybody: all the members of Municipal Affairs, all of the people from -- I've already done that; all of the people for their participation and all the MPPs who participated in the committee. Thank you very much. I'm sure the county of Simcoe will be a lot more efficient county and it will work out to the betterment of all the people involved. Thank you very much for your participation.

The Speaker (Hon David Warner): Mr Hayes has moved, in the absence of Mr Philip, third reading of Bill 51. Is it the pleasure of the House that the motion carry? Carried.

Resolved that the bill do now pass and be entitled as in the motion.

PUBLIC SERVICE AND LABOUR RELATIONS STATUTE LAW AMENDMENT ACT, 1993 / LOI DE 1993 MODIFIANT DES LOIS EN CE QUI CONCERNE LA FONCTION PUBLIQUE ET LES RELATIONS DE TRAVAIL

Mr Cooper moved, on behalf of Mr Mackenzie, third reading of Bill 117, An Act to revise the Crown Employees Collective Bargaining Act, to amend the Public Service Act and the Labour Relations Act and to make related amendments to other Acts / Projet de loi 117, Loi révisant la Loi sur la négociation collective des employés de la Couronne, modifiant la Loi sur la fonction publique et la Loi sur les relations de travail et apportant des modifications connexes à d'autres lois.

The Speaker (Hon David Warner): The member for Kitchener-Wilmot has moved third reading. Does he have any remarks?

Mr Mike Cooper (Kitchener-Wilmot): I'll be brief. It's my privilege this evening to move third reading of Bill 117, a bill designed to bring significant change and reform to labour relations in the Ontario public service.

Taken together, the three components of this bill will allow for more democratic and open labour relations between the government and its employees. The result is a package of proposals that is naturally linked and progressive for workers in the Ontario public service.

In each of the areas -- reform of the Crown Employees Collective Bargaining Act, whistleblowing protection, and expanding political activity -- change has been overdue and long sought by all parties.

We're modernizing the Crown Employees Collective Bargaining Act, otherwise known as CECBA, and bringing it more into line with the situation in other provinces. The act will be opened up in a number of ways, most of all by making collective bargaining available to most of the public servants who are now excluded from organizing, and by extending the scope of issues which may be bargained.

We also intend to lessen the reliance on binding arbitration in public sector labour disputes. However, as in the Labour Relations Act, public sector employers and employees will be able to refer some unresolved matters to arbitration by mutual agreement at any time during the collective bargaining process. The Ontario public servants will receive the right to strike but only after essential services have been designated and protected ahead of time. The public can therefore be assured that no threat to essential services will exist in the event of a public sector strike or lockout.

If the essential service designations are found by the Labour Relations Board to prevent meaningful collective bargaining, they will have the power to order arbitration or some other alternative to a strike, but the board will not be able to make such an order until after a strike has begun.

These reforms benefit both workers and the employer. They give rights to working men and women in the public sector that they have been requesting for many years. They will also allow the two parties to seriously begin developing the better working relationships that are necessary to improve both the quality of work and the services government provides.

Two other components of Bill 117 will recognize the new realities in which the Ontario public service is working. Ontario will be the first jurisdiction to legislate protection for public service whistleblowers. We intend to protect government employees who in good faith wish to bring forth allegations of serious wrongdoing in the public interest without fear of being penalized. At the same time, we feel our proposals strike a very necessary balance. We have a duty not only to protect whistleblowers but also to ensure that allegations are dealt with in a manner that is professional, responsible and fair to all concerned.

Finally, Bill 117 will result in expanded political activity rights for crown employees. Under our proposals, most crown employees will have more freedom to comment on political issues, to canvass without having to take leave of absence and to take voluntary leave of absence to seek political nomination at any level of government. As a result, crown employees will enjoy freedoms similar to their counterparts in the private sector without threatening the traditional neutrality of the public service.

Bill 117 is progressive for workers, practical for government to administer and protective of the public interest. I ask this House to grant it speedy final approval.

The Speaker: I thank the honourable member for Kitchener-Wilmot for his presentation and invite any questions and/or comments. Is there further debate on the bill?

Mr David Turnbull (York Mills): I'm going to be extremely brief with this, but I just want to put on the record a few points. This is another of the government's omnibus bills which has bundled together three distinct areas of legislation that should more appropriately be brought forward as separate legislation.

Our party is going to be voting against Bill 117, and I want to tell you that had you separated it out into the separate components, we may not have been voting against all of them. But as it stands, we are going to vote against it.

The three distinct areas of this bill are the so-called CECBA reforms, the political activity and the whistleblowing.

Under CECBA reforms, this will allow the public sector to strike. It can be argued that perhaps you might get better settlements if you allow them to strike, but I can tell you, from all of our readings of the mood of the public, there is no acceptance of the right of public servants to strike. They are very lucky to have jobs today.

When I speak to my constituents who are out of work, who've maybe spent their whole lives being employed by major or minor corporations, and now they're faced with the fact that after 20, 30 or even 40 years, they're unemployed prior to retirement age, the thought that public servants, who are being paid, in the opinion of the taxpayers, a terribly inflated amount of dollars, are now going to be allowed to strike, I can tell you, there's great disgust.

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Do we want to turn the Ontario public service into something equivalent to the post office? I can tell you, the public is absolutely revolted at the service they've had from the post office over the years, at the fact that we've had this constant battle of strikes, of people whining that they need more money and now have got more money than in the private sector.

If we look at the history of public service, we find that many years ago the public service had less money than the comparable jobs in the private sector. Today, typically they have more money and we're talking about giving them the right to strike. Are you kidding? Are you serious? I think that when I speak to more rational people in the public service, they don't have any stomach for strikes, because they are telling us they don't like this legislation. This legislation is going to force initially 2,000 people who don't want to be in a union into a public service union without any option as to which union. They are being told that they're going to go into OPSEU, and we get all kinds of gobbledegook from the government that there's a community of interest. Well, let me tell you, there's a community of interest among people who are currently in OPSEU who don't want to be in OPSEU and would like to get out of it. Is the government offering them the right to a secret ballot to get out? No, it's not.

The government's explanation is that putting these 2,000 people into OPSEU is only a one-time thing, that next time around they'll be able to opt out. There seems to be something fundamentally flawed in that process, that you force people into a union and then they can opt out next time around. What about allowing a secret vote to allow them to decide whether they want to join the union? But that would be too democratic. We would --

Mr Kimble Sutherland (Oxford): Conrad Black.

Mr Turnbull: I hear somebody from the NDP yapping about Conrad Black. The fact is that the government doesn't like the idea of allowing public service employees to have the right to a secret ballot to decide where they're going.

Hon Frances Lankin (Minister of Economic Development and Trade): This from a Tory. Give me a break.

Mr Turnbull: I hear the Minister of Economic Development and Trade yapping, "Oh, this from a Tory." I'll tell you this from a Tory: We believe in democracy, madam, and that is a principle that maybe you don't understand. This may be the title of your party, but when you force 2,000 people without any option whatsoever to go into a union, that doesn't smack of being very democratic.

We have heard from these people and many of them have said that they would either like to go into another union or not into a union at all. But this legislation forces them into this. That is the reason we cannot vote for this, because it is fundamentally undemocratic.

The implication of this bill, as we demonstrated very adequately last night during clause-by-clause, is that the government is going to force crown attorneys into a situation that they would have to strike. Let me point out that this would put those crown attorneys into conflict with the rules of conduct of the Law Society of Upper Canada. I really wish that the people who are in the House here tonight had been here last night to hear the absolutely hopeless explanation and defence that the parliamentary assistant put up to this, because it was totally, woefully inadequate.

The fact is that the rules of conduct of the Law Society of Upper Canada preclude the right to strike; you cannot remove those services. The government totally failed to answer that charge.

Notwithstanding that, here we have third reading tonight. The government is ramming it through without allowing the test as to whether this is ethical in the sense of putting people in conflict.

The parliamentary assistant in trying to defend that clause last night suggested that maybe 85% of the crown attorneys would be deemed to be essential service employees, so it would only require 15% to go on strike. That doesn't cut it. The parliamentary assistant suggested that the rest could maybe work on a slowdown. Let me tell you that according to the lawyers I have spoken to, if they were to slow down, that would be considered to be a breach of their professional conduct.

So here we have a government that is bringing forward legislation which will force public sector employees to be in a conflict between a bill that the government is rolling ahead with and the rules of professional conduct. I can tell you that the rules of professional conduct are certainly of a lot higher standard than this government understands or is presenting with this piece of legislation.

The second section, political activity: Quite frankly, if this had been separate bills, you would perhaps have had the Conservatives voting with the government on this, because political activity has been ruled by the courts to be in order.

The government has reduced the size of the group of people who are precluded from political activity under this legislation and in fact has allowed certain leaves of absence for senior public servants under certain conditions so long as they do not speak out on any area that affected the ministry in which they were engaged.

But I'm very worried about this section too, because this government has moved to an unusual degree in the politicization of the civil service. There can be no doubt about it that every government that this province has ever seen, and probably any province or the federal government has ever seen, has had some element of political appointees within its ranks. That is not what I'm arguing about.

But the fact that this government has moved to appoint as the most senior person, the head of the civil service, the man who headed the NDP's last provincial election campaign, David Agnew, is something that's absolutely disgraceful, because it means that for the taxpayer, when this government is defeated, as it undoubtedly will be in the next election -- I'm not presuming to say whether it will be the Liberals or the Conservatives who will form the government. All I'm saying is, I am confident that the NDP will be wiped out as a power in this province.

When that happens, there can be no doubt about it that such appointments as David Agnew and his ilk will in fact have to be discharged. When you start discharging senior civil servants, there is a cost, and the cost is borne by the taxpayer, because it must be quite clear that it is unacceptable for any government to take over and accept as the most senior person in the civil service the man who ran the NDP's provincial campaign in the last election. So there is a problem that we have with the political activity.

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Turning to the last section of the bill, the whistleblowing, this completes some political promises that were made to the Liberals in their famous accord, but it is interesting to note how toothless this legislation is. When the NDP were in opposition, they always talked about some all-encompassing whistleblowing legislation. I note that the member for St Catharines, who has been around this House for a long time and has heard a lot of the NDP rhetoric, both from the government side and the opposition side over the years, is nodding his head in agreement.

This legislation on whistleblowing is useless because it establishes a council to tell the individual ministries that are accused of grave misconduct to investigate themselves. How utterly ludicrous.

Last night in clause-by-clause I introduced on behalf of the Progressive Conservatives an amendment which would allow the council to determine, if they considered the breach to be of such a significant nature that they thought it appropriate that the individual ministry not investigate itself, that the council would have the discretion to request the Provincial Auditor, the OPP or the Solicitor General, or any other ministry which it thought appropriate, to come in and investigate that breach. The government voted it down. Why? That's the fundamental question.

In opposition you were in favour of putting teeth in whistleblowing legislation. This is the most toothless piece of legislation that you could possibly have brought forward. It is absolutely window dressing. If you had accepted my amendment, I would suggest that it perhaps might have worked, but instead you didn't, because in those great words, those immortal words of Robert K. Rae QC, "That was then; this is now." They don't want this to work.

The legislation, therefore, is toothless. The PCs believe in the political activity. We believe in the merit of whistleblowing legislation. We don't believe in giving the public service the right to strike, and we certainly don't believe in forcing people into unions without a democratic, secret vote.

Interjections.

Mr Drummond White (Durham Centre): No, you want to keep them on as contract employees for 30 years.

Mr Turnbull: It's quite extraordinary to hear heckling from the NDP about democracy. What you could possibly have with a secret vote that you find objectionable is completely beyond me. But that is the reason we will be voting against this legislation.

In wrapping up the last bill that I will be speaking to for this session before we wind down for Christmas, I would like on a more gentle note to wish my colleagues from all sides, the staff and all of the viewers a very merry Christmas, a very happy Hanukkah. Let's not get too serious about this.

Hon Ms Lankin: I want to start by saying what a delight it is tonight to have the opportunity to be here and to take part in the debate on this bill. It is an important moment for me.

There have been many moments of great pride since I've been in government. I think of issues like seeing the most progressive employment equity legislation brought to bear here in Ontario to provide fair pay and equitable pay situations for women in employment situations in this province. I think of employment equity legislation which is far-reaching, which will have a tremendous impact on our province.

I think of many experiences I had in the Ministry of Health: when we were able to extend, for the first time, funding to free-standing abortion clinics; when we were able to bring about the regulation of midwifery; for the first time tendering for a free-standing birthing clinic.

There have been many opportunities that I have had to experience great pride, but tonight I have to say, given the importance of this issue to myself and to many, many people who are very important to me, it's a moment I will cherish and remember as a contribution to this province and a contribution, I think, to the structure and to the operation of the Ontario public service.

Mr Speaker, I think that primarily tonight, because I promised I would keep my remarks short -- and I count on you, as you are always of great assistance during question period, to keep me to my time, to help me keep my attention on the clock -- I intend to keep my comments primarily directed to the personal, but every now and then there are things that are said by members of parties opposite that beg some response.

I do have to say to the member for York Mills, who is a member of the third party, the Conservative Party in this province of Ontario, that to hear him argue that amendments that are being brought forward to the Crown Employees Collective Bargaining Act somehow are not reflective of democracy is absolutely absurd, given the role of the Conservative Party in government in bringing about the original Crown Employees Collective Bargaining Act, which completely obliterated rights for public servants.

It completely left public service workers to the realm of second-class citizens when it came to the world of collective bargaining and to trade union rights and to workers' rights. That was what democracy meant to the Tory party. That's what democracy often means to the Tory party when it's dealing with unions and workers' rights. It still does mean that and it smacks of hypocrisy to hear those kinds of allegations alleged across the floor.

Mr Turnbull: Talk about hypocrisy. This is the payoff, the ultimate payoff to Fred Upshaw, $2 million.

Hon Ms Lankin: I will move back to my original intent, which was to speak to this issue from --

Mrs Margaret Marland (Mississauga South): On a point of order, Mr Speaker: I'm sorry to have to rise on a point of order, but twice before today members have had to withdraw the use of the word "hypocrisy," and another member two days earlier than this in this House had to withdraw the use of the word "hypocrisy." I bring to your attention that the honourable minister did just use that word.

The Speaker: To the member for Beaches-Woodbine, she will know that this word should not be tossed about loosely. I'm sure she would not want to say anything that was unparliamentary, nor would she wish to be a cause of disorder in the chamber. I would ask her to keep that in mind as she addresses the Chair.

Hon Ms Lankin: The Speaker certainly knows I wouldn't wish to be a cause of disorder in the chamber at any point in time. Let me say that I withdraw the comment. I think I feel very strongly about the allegations that were made by the member for York Mills. However, the main point of the comments I wanted to focus on tonight was comments of a personal nature. I will in fact focus on those.

It was in about 1978 when I first joined the Ontario public service. I joined the public service as a correctional officer at the Toronto Jail. I had, in the years prior to that -- I was just recently graduated from university -- been involved in student politics and community politics, municipal politics and provincial politics as an activist, as a person who worked in election campaigns, who strove to bring issues to the forefront of campaigns, to public attention and to advocate for change.

I found myself, as a member of the public service, at the first opportunity that an election campaign came along prohibited from participating in the electoral process, in the democratic process, because of legislative prohibitions that existed that said anyone who worked for the Ontario government couldn't go out and campaign, couldn't participate in an election of any sort. I found it odd to see that a jail guard working at the Toronto Jail would somehow be prohibited from exercising their democratic rights and being involved in an election campaign.

As I learned more about the issue and the prohibitions and what people would only be able to view as strange, I guess, contradictions that existed -- for example, if you were a snowplow operator who worked for the Ontario government, you couldn't be politically active, but if you worked for the municipal government, you could.

I found that the law was one that was not a good law. It was one without basis in good public policy and as we finally saw, with reference from the courts and work that was done by the Ontario Law Reform Commission and years of lobbying on behalf of the Ontario Public Service Employees Union, a change has come about in which we see today legislation being passed -- if I go back to the old days of the slogans that were around this and around reform of CECBA, "Free the servants" -- that will free the servants, that will bring to them the right to be politically active as other citizens of this province are. As I got involved in that issue, I also got drawn to union activity, as I was a jail guard at the Toronto Don jail. Those were the first days I became involved with the Ontario Public Service Employees Union.

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As the members here know, I went on to become a staff member of that union and over many years experienced collective bargaining in the Ontario public service, first as a member, as a worker covered by the collective agreement, and then as a negotiator, negotiating on behalf of those workers, the regime that was in place under the Crown Employees Collective Bargaining Act.

It was a regime which really relegated public servants, public service workers, to second-class citizens with respect to labour relations rights, a law which said there are certain issues that can't be negotiated, on which the employer has the complete right to determine all conditions, as the union has no ability to address this in the realm of collective bargaining, a law that dictated that the parties, if they had issues in dispute, would resolve them by reference to binding arbitration, a system which doesn't place pressures on the parties to deal seriously with their issues, a system which doesn't allow for the maturation of labour relations within the Ontario public service.

We see today changes to the Crown Employees Collective Bargaining Act that the union, of which I was a member and in which I was employed for a number of years, has been fighting for for 21 years, since the first piece of legislation called the Crown Employees Collective Bargaining Act came into place. I myself have been involved in the struggle for the change of this legislation for 15 years.

The third issue, whistleblowing, is a very important issue and it's often been made light of in the House. People refer to, if there's a leaked cabinet document and the source of the leak is being investigated, somehow that runs against our commitment to whistleblowing. The people who have fought for this legislation for years are talking about much more serious circumstances than that. They're talking about where public servants, public service workers, become aware of serious wrongdoing in the public service, and as their responsibility and their duty to the public want to have a mechanism to be able to bring that to public attention, a mechanism in which they are protected.

You can look back into the cases in history in which individuals have come forward because their conscience dictated, as good public servants, that they bring these issues forward and that they serve in their duty to the public in the most responsible way by making these issues transparent to the public, and in which they have suffered the consequences of employment loss as a result of having violated their oath.

What we're putting in place is a regime and a process by which people can bring these issues forward and have it determined that their issues are not of a frivolous nature or not of a mistaken nature but of a serious wrongdoing, and they can have those issues viewed and investigated and made public. It is an opportunity for the dedicated workers in the Ontario public service to continue to show how they want to serve the public.

There are many people who have for a number of years been fighting to see these changes. I indicated that I've been involved with these issues for 15 years. I remember, during the period of the accord between the Liberals and the New Democratic Party that as an executive member of the New Democratic Party, I was able to have some of these issues written into the accord as part of the agenda for the Liberal government. Those issues were never delivered on. They didn't materialize in terms of legislated change.

Finally, I'm having an opportunity, in government, to see these issues highlighted in the throne speech and eventually to have been worked through in an omnibus bill brought forward tonight, and to see all three pieces of legislation being amended, being brought into this next century, and to really set the stage for major reform with respect to labour relations in the Ontario public service and to allow for that maturation of the parties in their relationship with each other. I think it presents an opportunity for a tremendous basis for the future.

Before I close, because I did promise people that I would keep my remarks short tonight, I want to indicate that there are people who have joined us tonight in the gallery from the Ontario Public Service Employees Union. We're pleased to welcome them here tonight: John Ford, Walter Belyea, Andy Todd -- Andy, I will indicate, was my direct employer and boss for a number of years and I'm pleased to see him here tonight; he himself has been working for reform to CECBA for 20 years and I'm sure this is a night that is important to him -- Frank Rooney and Bill Kuehnbaum, who is the vice-president of the Ontario Public Service Employees Union. Their presence here tonight is important. It indicates at this late hour how important they think these reforms are.

Again, may I say that I am delighted to have had this opportunity to speak on this bill and I'm delighted to see this very important legislation be passed by this Legislature of Ontario and to form the basis for a new relationship in the Ontario public service and for the future of collective bargaining for Ontario public service workers.

The Speaker: I thank the member for Beaches-Woodbine for her contribution to the debate and invite any questions and/or comments.

Mrs Marland: I'm just wondering how the honourable minister feels about this bill versus Bill 48, the social contract bill that we passed in the summer, which I certainly recall this minister voting in favour of. I think, in light of her comments on behalf of organized civil servants and others in this province, it's rather a contradiction for her to stand in the House tonight and speak so strongly in support of this bill, having voted in favour of Bill 48, the social contract, less than four months ago.

Mr Norman W. Sterling (Carleton): I just want to say that I appreciate the minister's response or her comments on this bill because I think they are sincerely made. I only want to say to her that she may view the other side as being biased, but I think that her comments come from an experience in her time working within the public service, which quite frankly doesn't represent what in fact the Ontario public want with regard to their relationship with their public servants.

I just want her to know that when we get late on in the session, while I respect her comments, I vehemently oppose this kind of legislation which does not take into account the respect for the whole other part of the equation. The whole other part of the equation is the interests of the citizens of Ontario in dealing with the public servants, the security of those public servants when they are dealing with their employers, and also this horrendous apparatus that is being set up to whistleblow.

Quite frankly, it will not work, in my estimation. This bill will pass, but it will be a problem because if you give someone the chance to go to a commissioner either to be judged whether or not this is a worthwhile matter which should be exposed or you put that matter in a brown paper envelope and send to somebody, I think I know which option that particular individual will take. I think this legislation is impractical for that reason.

Mr White: I'd like to comment upon my colleague's words. I thought that they showed a great deal of depth of experience and a fullness from that depth of experience that was frankly quite moving. She spoke of years and years of struggle, of injustices, frankly, that this legislation is finally correcting, and I think it behooves us to pay attention to that richness of experience --

Mr James J. Bradley (St Catharines): Did you vote for the social contract?

Mr White: When we talk about the social contract, that is another issue which really does merit some exploration, but it's not an issue that merits exploration this evening.

I want to again compliment my colleague on behalf of my riding and the many public servants in my area who have benefited from this legislation and from her guidance.

Mr Bradley: I find it interesting that a government which has, I think in about the last month, broken three different strikes in the education sector is introducing legislation or at least dealing with legislation in its final stages this evening which will give public servants the right to strike.

That could mean that they're giving them the right to strike only to remove that right to strike or order them back to work whenever it's convenient to the government, just as happened, for instance, in Saskatchewan. The NDP government in Saskatchewan ordered the nurses back to work before they even went out on strike because there was a provincial election coming up and it wanted to ensure that those people would be back to work or on the job during that provincial election.

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It seems a contradiction that, on one hand, you would be advocating legislation which would provide the right to strike, and on the other hand, your record over the last few weeks has been one which is breaking one strike after another. Where there's legitimate collective bargaining taking place, where people have had the right to strike since 1975, where in opposition you voted against every one of those back-to-work bills, you have now sent the teachers back to work on all those occasions.

The second part I would comment upon is the so-called whistleblowing provisions. Again, what is contained in the bill and what your government has been doing over the past several months are two different things. I know there's a quarrel with my friend the Premier over the definition of who's responsible for this, but your government, through its civil servants, through ministers who communicate with those civil servants, has in fact had the OPP investigating members of the news media, members of the opposition and no doubt trying to trace back to civil servants who is providing information in brown envelopes.

Once again, on the one hand, you're providing an opportunity for whistleblowing, and on the other hand, your record is that you keep taking it away.

The Speaker: The member for Beaches-Woodbine has up to two minutes for her reply.

Hon Ms Lankin: The member for St Catharines who just joined us I think missed my comments earlier. I'm pleased to be able to repeat that part of it and say that I think his continued comments of references to leaked cabinet documents and the process of those leaks and the existence of leaked documents being investigated as somehow being equivalent to whistleblowing or being contradictory to the government's intention and desire to have whistleblowing protection diminishes the importance of this piece of legislation and of the lives of people who have been destroyed in the past because they have come forward with matters of conscience, with serious wrongdoings that they thought needed to be exposed and become transparent for the public. I wish he would make those distinctions. I think they are important distinctions.

To the member for Carleton, may I say that he talks about a cumbersome process and one that he thinks will not work. We will do our best to make this process work. We will try to work with it and we will improve it if it needs improvement. But this is an important event where now we will have protection in place, where people like Mr MacAlpine, who lost his job for coming forward, for exposing the kind of wrongdoing that was going on in the Ministry of Natural Resources at the time, will be protected in the future, unlike they were under your government. Again, if there are criticisms with respect to how the process works, those are things we can deal with in the future.

May I say to the member for Mississauga South, as the House draws to a close and as we all share moments of cheer, even her negative comments tonight cannot take away my joy at seeing the passage of this very important legislation.

Mr Steven W. Mahoney (Mississauga West): It's nice to see the leader of the third party is joining us this evening. One of the things that's most interesting is the number of cabinet ministers we have here for this bill. I think we should have question period. There are more cabinet ministers, including the Premier -- all the heavy-hitters are here -- for this labour bill once again than we get at a normal question period.

Hon Floyd Laughren (Deputy Premier and Minister of Finance): Go ahead.

Mr Mahoney: You'd like to, I'm sure. Maybe we'd get an answer. My first question is, which one of you is on this list? Who's here? Oh, that's a long list. There's a couple of heroes there, but it is interesting. It tells me something.

Hon Mr Laughren: Ask the question.

Mr Mahoney: I guess the question is, why are you here? Let me answer it. I have an opinion.

It seems to me that, when we dealt with Bill 40 in the final reading, the cabinet benches were full and the back benches were full. Of course they were all in here as good trained seals and whipped to attention. When we dealt with Bill 80, the Premier came in and decided he had to speak. It's very unusual, you will admit, Mr Speaker, for the first minister of the province to actually come in and address a piece of legislation that's been going through the process -- not unprecedented, but very unusual.

Then we go to another labour bill, Bill 117, complete with members of the union in the audience, and once again we wind up with a plethora of cabinet ministers.

Interjections.

Mr Mahoney: We'll get the dictionary out, Mr Speaker.

We'll get the dictionary out for the members opposite. I guess you could call it a gaggle, a large group, shall we call it, of cabinet ministers obviously and including the Premier, who I understood was going to speak to this particular bill to celebrate the point at which he finds his government but is now not going to speak.

But I find it quite interesting that it's only labour bills. Look what else: I ask you, where were you when we dealt with the Windsor back-to-work strikebreaking legislation? Where were you?

Hon Mr Laughren: You supported it.

Mr Mahoney: Oh, but where were you? Why weren't you here? The Treasurer was here because the minister responsible for it wasn't here and he read it for him. But why did we not have a large number --

Hon Mr Laughren: Never. Public responsibilities.

Mr Mahoney: Could it be that the cabinet in the Bob Rae government was embarrassed at passing its third strikebreaking legislation? Could it be that the same group of men and women, who when in opposition would have stood and railed for hours and perhaps days against strikebreaking legislation, are just a little embarrassed? I ask you. It seems to me a fair question, and since this is not question period, I'll answer my own question. I think the answer is yes, they're embarrassed. They weren't here for that.

Where were they on Bill 121, when they're borrowing -- I use the word tactfully so as not to be unparliamentary, Mr Speaker -- from the teachers' pension, from their own future?

Mr Bradley: Borrowing?

Mr Mahoney: Well, someone said stealing, but I wouldn't say that. Borrowing, adjusting, playing games, paying off the leadership in the teachers' union in some way so they can sort of play funny games with the teachers.

Mr Speaker, you weren't here when we were in government -- I understand you were before -- but I'm sure you watched with some eagerness. It must have been rather interesting for you to watch the howls of outrage and the accusations of manipulation against the former Treasurer, Robert Nixon, over -- what? -- teachers' pensions. Interesting. They weren't here. We have 16 of them here for a labour bill. They don't have the courage to come in and deal with the other bills they put on. Where were they when they took place?

I find it passing strange, but not hard to figure. It is quarter to 11 on Tuesday --

Mr Murray J. Elston (Bruce): December 14.

Mr Mahoney: December 14, my House leader says -- and we have 16 cabinet ministers in here to celebrate another labour bill.

Let me tell you, Mr Premier, the problem with these bills is that the public at large doesn't really understand and frankly doesn't care what you're doing with this stuff. The taxpayers are so beleaguered they're simply trying to survive and they don't really understand that down the road there will be a major price to pay for Bill 117.

The minister knows it. Talk to me about the fact that in here this government is putting in place a system that will allow arbitrators to determine what are essential services in this province. Explain to me why this government would abdicate its responsibility to the taxpayers at large to determine on your own what are essential services and then move on from there.

Explain to me what we're going to do in 1996 when this Premier and this government are nowhere to be seen and are simply a bad memory for most of us. Explain to me what we're going to do when the people come back and say: "I just happen to have some Rae days that I've been saving up. Here they are. You guys owe me some money and I want to sit down and talk." If we don't pay, I suppose there's a potential for a right to strike in there.

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Now, the question that the minister who so proudly stands up as a former minister and champion of OPSEU, who was nowhere to be seen during the recent social contract debate -- I don't even need that picture again. She voted for it. The Premier voted for it. The Minister of Labour, of all people, voted for the social contract. That piece of legislation will come back to haunt the future taxpayers of this province for years to come, and they know that.

Many little tricks are being played; unrelated to labour but just to give you an example, the fact that they now sell licences six years in advance. What does that mean? People think: "Well, that's really convenient. I don't have to come back for six more years to get my driver's licence renewed."

Well, isn't that wonderful. Thank you very much.

Mr Bradley: Stick the next government with no money.

Mr Mahoney: As my colleague from St Catharines says, where's the money? You're taking six years of revenue for just that one service into your current budget. What is it going to do for future governments? In a best-case scenario, you have two years to live and breathe as the government of this province. Best case for you; worst case for everyone else. In reality, it's more likely 18 months. So in 18 to 24 months, you're collecting six years of revenue. What is the next government to say when it doesn't have that revenue base to call on? "Well, we can't help it. The former guys took all the money in and they spent it because they mismanaged the economy and they ran $10-billion deficits each and every year."

This is the kind of trickery that is going on, and the only bills that can be brought into this place that deal with what you call democracy and what you call collective bargaining are bills that either pander to certain leaders in the labour movement or are paybacks because of other legislation that you've introduced, such as the social contract.

What is this? I wonder how Fred Upshaw really feels in his heart of hearts about picking up 8,000 new members, potentially; 2,000 right off the bat. The minute the Lieutenant Governor proclaims this this evening, immediately following these debates, Fred Upshaw becomes richer by 2,000 members, and those 2,000 members have no choice but to go along with the dictates of this government as to who will bargain on their behalf.

I ask you, why should they not have a choice? How can you possibly define that kind of activity as democratic? Whose eyes are you pulling the wool over? It's truly amazing. Talk to me about the veterinarians. We put some amendments today. We asked you to be fair.

I know, I know, I know; I see the clock. I won't be long. There are people in the community who have called and said: "We would like to have a choice as to who bargains for us. Can you put an amendment forward?" We said, "Certainly we can." We talked about the veterinarians in the employ of the public service, we talked about the dentists and we put amendments, only to have them voted down by this arrogant majority government.

We talked about six landscape architects working in the Ontario public service who said: "We would like to have some say towards who bargains on our behalf. We think we are a unique group within the Ontario public service." Would it break Mr Upshaw's heart to lose the revenue from the union dues from six landscape architects? I hardly think so.

What is the government's response? "Sorry. We're going to make the decision for you. Bill 117 is going to go through intact. We are going to ignore those pleas." Why not just adopt our amendments? At one time it was suggested to me that the government was actually going to put a friendly amendment to our amendment to exclude the dentists, to allow the dentists to have a say in who negotiates for them. We were approached by one of the parliamentary assistants who said they were prepared to include the architects. I don't understand what happened. All of a sudden, that fell right off the table. They voted against the amendment on the architects; they voted against the amendment on the dentists and they voted against the amendment on the veterinarians. You call that democracy? I call that pigheaded stubbornness. I call that anything but a democratic process that ignores the concerns and the pleas of three very small minority groups within the public service which simply asked for a little fairness.

One final comment on the whistleblowing. The concern I have with the whistleblowing is: Who's actually going to adjudicate? As I understand it, the complaint will go to the deputy, and if the deputy can't resolve it, it will ultimately go to the minister. The purpose of whistleblowing is to take away the potential for political interference or political intimidation. Is someone who is blowing the whistle on a wrongdoing in their department going to have the confidence they will need to approach a deputy minister, ultimately a cabinet minister, and put their future in the hands of that individual?

The principle is fine. I support the principle. The concern I have once again, as in many of the instances, whether it's occupational health and safety or anything that this government does -- the principles are fine; it's the implementation of the act and the principles that this government is just totally incapable of dealing with. Now you're going to say to a public servant: "Don't worry about a thing. We're going to take your complaint up to a deputy minister and you can rest assured there will be no retribution to you."

I suggest to you that many of the men and women who work in the public service are not going to have the confidence to make those complaints. In fact, this is an attempt to live up to a throne speech promise that was made three years ago by the Premier in this place. But it is just a fob; it is phoney; it will not work because the implementation procedures are not there to ensure that there will be impartiality, to ensure that there will be fairness, to ensure that all intimidation will be taken out of this piece of legislation.

Once again, as has been referred to, the politicization of the public service is unprecedented under the direction of Bob Rae; it is unprecedented under the direction of David Agnew. There is no reason for us in opposition, or for anyone in this province, to have any sense of confidence that anything is going to change under this legislation.

Mr Speaker, I appreciate your patience. I've talked longer than I intended to. We are very much against this legislation. We feel it is simply a payback on the part of the Premier. The fact that they're all here celebrating this tonight -- I assume there'll be some kind of a candlelight wine and cheese party to which everyone -- I'm sure not us -- will be invited to celebrate: one more stake in the heart of this province of Ontario; one more trophy for Bob Rae and the labour leaders he's giving in to on this one; one more opportunity for this socialist Premier to say "I'm very sorry" to Fred Upshaw and Sid Ryan and everybody else in this. "I'm very sorry; here's a little something for you."

It's phoney and it's wrong.

The Speaker: I thank the honourable member for Mississauga West for his contribution to the debate and invite any questions and/or comments.

Mr Michael D. Harris (Nipissing): I just want to briefly comment on the remarks that've been made by the member for Mississauga West. I particularly want to address the 2,000 very dedicated public servants of the province of Ontario whom the Minister of Economic Development and Trade -- we used to call it "Industry" when we used to have jobs in Ontario and people wanted to come to invest and work in Ontario -- a former OPSEU negotiator and member of the union, has spoken on behalf of tonight.

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She has indicated that the former Tory government of 42 years and the former Liberal government would not --

Mr Anthony Perruzza (Downsview): Oh Mike, don't undermine confidence. This is the best province in which to work and in which to live.

The Speaker: Order. The member for Downsview, come to order.

Mr Harris: -- force these 2,000 people to join the union and give $2 million to OPSEU. The minister is quite right. We would not force these 2,000 to join OPSEU; we would not force these 2,000 to pay the $2 million to join the union. In fact this government has said to 7,000: "You can have a choice. Do you want to join a union? If so, which union?" But for 2,000, they've said: "No choice; $2 million. You've got to join OPSEU; you've got to pay up."

I'm proud to stand here and say that for 42 years we gave a choice. I want to tell you something else: Eighteen months from now our commitment is that we will give these 2,000 another choice. If you don't want to pay $2 million to OPSEU, you don't have to pay $2 million to OPSEU.

I want to speak as well on behalf of 94% of the nurses at the psychiatric hospital in North Bay, who said: "No way. We don't want to join OPSEU. We don't want to pay our union dues there." And so I lend my support to --

The Speaker: The member's time has expired. Would the member take his seat, please? Further questions and/or comments? The member for Downsview.

Mr Perruzza: Just very briefly, just to put on record, I am proud to live in this province, I am proud to work in this province, because I believe that this province continues to be the best place in the world in which to work and in which to invest and in which to live.

Mr Bradley: I would be remiss if I didn't comment on my colleague's eloquent and loud speech this evening in this House, but he had to speak loudly because there was a din of discussion going on on the other side while he was here.

He was saying that this was going to curry favour with perhaps one or two of the unions within this province, but I want to ask the member whether or not he could hear the very large noise I heard when the OFL convention was on in Toronto and people were banging at the front door and they were trying to get in to protest the policies of this government. These were members of the trade union movement who had come up the street who were disgusted. They were the ones who were among those who had this list.

Mr Gordon Mills (Durham East): I'm fed up looking at that.

Mr Bradley: Well, I'll put this down because the member for Durham East is fed up looking at it, he said. But I was wondering if my colleague from Mississauga West could not hear outside the tumultuous protest of people in the trade union movement who felt they had been betrayed by this government, which removed the right to collective bargaining for thousands upon thousands of public servants in the province of Ontario.

Probably among that group out there were members of the teachers' union who had already had the government break two of their strikes in this session. Of course the protest didn't do much good, because today in came another bill to break a strike. We didn't have the Premier in for that bill, we didn't have the Minister of Labour, we couldn't find anybody who wanted to introduce it. I was wondering whether he had heard that protest at the door. I think Buzz Hargrove was out there too.

Mr Chris Stockwell (Etobicoke West): I would just like to say that even the government members, I would think, would say that if it was a fair and honest approach to organizing a specific union and asking people if they wanted to join a union, they would be given an option. Everyone deserves an option whether to join or not to join. Some would choose to and others would not. You'd think that they would allow these 2,000 employees a right to vote. What is more democratic and fundamental in this country that we live in than the right to vote as to whether or not you want to be part of or participate in organized labour?

I would say it would make sense to me that they should be allowed to have a secret ballot to tell this government whether they think it's appropriate --

Mr George Mammoliti (Yorkview): Will they reap the same benefit?

Mr Stockwell: -- or acceptable on their part to become part of this organized labour.

Mr Mammoliti: Hey, Stockwell, I'm asking you a question.

Mr Stockwell: I hear the member for Yorkview. Excuse me?

Mr Mammoliti: I'm asking you a question.

Mr Stockwell: I didn't hear his question, I'm sorry.

All I would say to the government members across the floor is that if you're so certain that these 2,000 people are prepared to join this union, are prepared to have a union negotiate on their behalf, why is it you will not give them the most fundamental and basic right any person in a democratic society would demand, and that's the right to freedom of choice: the choice to be represented, the choice to belong and the choice to pay union dues.

Mr Mammoliti: Stockwell, in your world, will they reap the same benefits?

Mr Stockwell: I say to you, Mr Speaker, through you to the minister, and to the member, if you don't give them that option I can only say this is not a choice; this is dictatorial. Any time you bring in legislation that dictates people and what they can do, I will always stand and oppose.

The Speaker: The member for Mississauga West has up to two minutes for his reply.

Mr Mahoney: First of all, I thank the leader of the third party and the member for Etobicoke West for their comments because I think, fundamentally, they hit the basic issue, which has to do with the freedom of choice and the democratic right of those 2,000 members. I also raise the point of the democratic right of the veterinarians, the dentists and the landscape architects, which have been ignored.

I want to make a point. My colleague the member for St Catharines asked whether or not I heard the ruckus that was going on out on the front lawn. Mr Speaker, I did. I heard it. You know, I assumed, just listening to the noise, that it must be those Bay Street guys who are storming the doors in the Legislature who are upset with this government. It must be -- I don't know -- Judith Andrew and small business, the CFIB, out front, upset with what is going on.

I never for one minute assumed that it would actually be the disciples of Gordon Wilson who would be on the front lawns of this august palace trying to tear down the pillars and get at the very roots of the person they think has betrayed them. I was quite shocked to find that out, because the reality is that the vast majority of the men and women who work around this province and belong to a trade labour union of one type or another are not socialists. They don't carry a card in any party, as a matter of fact. They are simply men and women who want to get through the day, who want to solve the problems of their own families.

Mr Bradley has a card, I know.

Mr Bradley: I have my NDP card.

Mr Mahoney: They're simply people who believe in democracy. They all sit there and they say, "I cannot believe I am seeing with my own eyes Bob Rae and the New Democrats betray me and betray democracy." It's quite a shock to the entire province.

The Speaker: Is there further debate? If not, the member for Kitchener-Wilmot has an opportunity to wrap up.

Mr Cooper: I'd like to rise today and thank all members of the House for their participation in this debate. While we recognize there are some ideological differences, I thank the two opposition parties for their participation and recognition that there are some difficulties with this legislation with some people.

What I'd like to do is commend the staff from the Ministry of Labour and the staff from the Management Board who spent countless years trying to get this legislation together. We're thankful that we now have a new dawn that encourages more democratic and open labour relations between the government and its employees.

I'd especially like to now take a page out of the member for Mississauga West's book, who quite often brings up his father in some of the debates on labour legislation, and thank my father, Vic Cooper, 20 years ago -- who's always been a public servant -- for bringing this to my attention. He's fought long and hard for some of the things that were brought forward in this bill.

I thank all members for their participation.

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The Speaker: Mr Cooper has moved third reading of Bill 117. Is it the pleasure of the House that the motion carry?

All those in favour will please say "aye."

All opposed will please say "nay."

In my opinion, the ayes have it.

I declare the motion carried.

Resolved that the bill be now passed and be entitled as in the motion.

Hon Brian A. Charlton (Government House Leader): Mr Speaker, His Honour the Lieutenant Governor awaits to give royal assent.

His Honour the Lieutenant Governor of the province 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 behalf of the said Legislative Assembly, I respectfully request Your Honour's assent.

Senior Clerk Assistant and Clerk of Journals (Mr Alex McFedries): The following are the titles of the bills to which Your Honour's assent is prayed:

Bill 26, An Act respecting Environmental Rights in Ontario / Projet de loi 26, Loi concernant les droits environnementaux en Ontario

Bill 31, An Act to amend the Income Tax Act / Projet de loi 31, Loi modifiant la Loi de l'impôt sur le revenu

Bill 33, An Act to amend the Representation Act / Projet de loi 33, Loi modifiant la Loi sur la représentation électorale

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

Bill 50, An Act to implement the Government's expenditure control plan and, in that connection, to amend the Health Insurance Act and the Hospital Labour Disputes Arbitration Act / Projet de loi 50, Loi visant à mettre en oeuvre le Plan de contrôle des dépenses du gouvernement et modifiant la Loi sur l'assurance-santé et la Loi sur l'arbitrage des conflits de travail dans les hôpitaux

Bill 51, An Act respecting the Restructuring of the County of Simcoe / Projet de loi 51, Loi concernant la restructuration du comté de Simcoe

Bill 74, An Act to amend the Highway Traffic Act / Projet de loi 74, Loi modifiant le Code de la route

Bill 79, An Act to provide for Employment Equity for Aboriginal People, People with Disabilities, Members of Racial Minorities and Women / Projet de loi 79, Loi prévoyant l'équité en matière d'emploi pour les autochtones, les personnes handicapées, les membres des minorités raciales et les femmes

Bill 80, An Act to amend the Labour Relations Act / Projet de loi 80, Loi modifiant la Loi sur les relations de travail

Bill 100, An Act to amend the Regulated Health Professions Act, 1991 / Projet de loi 100, Loi modifiant la Loi de 1991 sur les professions de la santé réglementées

Bill 117, An Act to revise the Crown Employees Collective Bargaining Act, to amend the Public Service Act and the Labour Relations Act and to make related amendments to other Acts / Projet de loi 117, Loi révisant la Loi sur la négociation collective des employés de la Couronne, modifiant la Loi sur la fonction publique et la Loi sur les relations de travail et apportant des modifications connexes à d'autres lois

Bill 121, An Act to amend the Teachers' Pension Act / Projet de loi 121, Loi modifiant la Loi sur le régime de retraite des enseignants

Bill 122, An Act to amend the Highway Traffic Act / Projet de loi 122, Loi modifiant le Code de la route

Bill 125, An Act to amend the Education Act / Projet de loi 125, Loi modifiant la Loi sur l'éducation

Bill 139, An Act to Settle the Dispute between The Board of Education for the City of Windsor and its Elementary School Teachers / Projet de loi 139, Loi visant à régler le conflit entre le conseil de l'éducation appelé The Board of Education for the City of Windsor et ses enseignants des écoles élémentaires

Bill Pr67, An Act to revive All-Wood Clearing Ltd.

Bill Pr68, An Act to revive Le Groupe Concorde Inc.

Bill Pr73, An Act to revive Ukrainian People's Home in Preston.

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.

The Speaker: May it please Your Honour, we, Her Majesty's most dutiful and faithful subjects of the Legislative Assembly of the Province of Ontario, in session assembled, approach Your Honour with sentiments of unfeigned devotion and loyalty to Her Majesty's person and government, and humbly beg to present for Your Honour's acceptance a bill entitled An Act to authorize the payment of certain amounts for the Public Service for the fiscal year ending on the 31st day of March, 1994 / Loi autorisant le paiement de certaines sommes destinées à la fonction publique pour l'exercice se terminant le 31 mars 1994.

Clerk of the House: His Honour the Lieutenant Governor doth thank Her Majesty's dutiful and loyal subjects, accept their benevolence and assent to this bill in Her Majesty's name.

Son Honneur le lieutenant-gouverneur remercie les bons et loyaux sujets de Sa Majesté, accepte leur bienveillance et sanctionne ce projet de loi au nom de Sa Majesté.

His Honour was then pleased to retire.

TOBACCO CONTROL ACT, 1993 / LOI DE 1993 SUR LA RÉGLEMENTATION DE L'USAGE DU TABAC

Resuming the adjourned debate on the motion for second reading of Bill 119, An Act to prevent the Provision of Tobacco to Young Persons and to regulate its Sale and Use by Others / Projet de loi 119, Loi visant à empêcher la fourniture de tabac aux jeunes et à en réglementer la vente et l'usage par les autres.

The Speaker (Hon David Warner): The member for Ottawa South had the floor last time. He is not present in the chamber. Is there further debate on this bill?

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Mr Jim Wilson (Simcoe West): I'm pleased to spend just a few minutes to debate second reading of Bill 119, the government's tobacco act. I just want to say at the beginning that I think it's kind of sad that we're debating this very important piece of health legislation at 20 after 11 on the last day that the Legislature will sit for this session this year.

None the less, I want to begin by commending the government for presenting this legislation, which is designed to combat the problem of tobacco consumption and specifically designed to stop people from starting to smoke. I think the social and health components of this legislation are essentially good and necessary if we are to dissuade adolescents from starting down the treacherous path of tobacco use. I'm looking forward to the public hearings which will occur in the social development committee, I believe beginning in February, because while the government has expressed its good intentions with respect to curbing the consumption of tobacco use through this legislation, I think we will find, and are finding since its introduction by the Minister of Health, that there are a number of very serious concerns with respect to this legislation.

I want to say from the beginning that if the government wanted an easy ride and was looking for good-news health legislation, it perhaps would have wanted to have considered omitting from this legislation the provision that bans the sale of tobacco from pharmacies and perhaps the provision that deals with running vending machine operators out of business and perhaps some of the other provisions that deal with the rather all-encompassing powers of the tobacco inspectors. I want to deal with a couple of those points this evening in the short time I have for the debate.

I think the biggest outcry that's accompanied the introduction of Bill 119 has come from those pharmacists who see this legislation as a legitimate threat to their survivability. I want to say at the outset that while the bill is well intended, the Ontario PC caucus very much sees this provision that bans the sale of tobacco in pharmacies as not a health issue but as a freedom-of-business issue. I cannot emphasize that enough.

I want to really just do two things in the short time I have. One is to read excerpts of a letter that was sent to all members of the Legislature from the Committee of Independent Pharmacists. That is the committee representing the small-town and small pharmacy operations in the province of Ontario. Attached to that committee's letter was a key, and that key is meant to symbolize a couple of things. It could be the key that opens up pharmacies in this province or it could be the key that will lock the doors of pharmacies that will close as a result of this legislation.

The Committee of Independent Pharmacists writes:

"This uncut key is symbolic of the keys to the front doors of our community pharmacies.

"If the Ontario government's proposal to ban tobacco is passed and includes a provision to ban the sale of tobacco products by pharmacies, then you and your colleagues" -- and they're writing to MPPs -- "can expect to receive approximately 300 genuine keys from pharmacists across the province who have been forced to close.

"These pharmacists will no longer have any use for their real keys because they will literally be out of business. Many community drugstores will disappear from the Ontario landscape.

"Not only will so many stores close but the total job loss will extend to every pharmacy in the province. Of those pharmacies who are able to survive, many will be forced to lay off people.

"Because tobacco represents such an important cash flow to our businesses, we have calculated, based on a comprehensive survey that in many stores seven people or more will have to be terminated. These job terminations taken together with pharmacy losings could very well lead to the loss of up to 10,000 jobs....

"This key represents closed pharmacies, lost jobs, decreased hours of operation and a reduction of health care services such as extended hours and emergency prescriptions. Think of the impact on the sick and aged in your constituency. The people in your area will be the ultimate losers."

That's the end of the quote from the committee's letter to MPPs. I think there are some very legitimate concerns expressed in this letter that will be the subject of debate during the committee hearings beginning in February.

I want to read very quickly from a second letter that was faxed to me today, from a Mr Alwyn Geen of Geen's Prescription Pharmacy Ltd in Belleville. I have to say in all sincerity that in my two and a half years as Health critic I have never seen a letter as poignantly and as well put together and as eloquently stated as this letter that was faxed to me today by Mr Geen. It's in response to a survey that my party sent out, a letter that I sent out to 5,600 pharmacists in the province of Ontario explaining our position with respect to the banning of the sale of tobacco products in pharmacies and also enclosing with that letter a survey that I am encouraging all pharmacists to send back to me. I owe a great deal of thanks to Mr Geen and I want all members to pay attention for just a few short minutes and to listen to what Mr Geen has to say.

In his letter Mr Geen speaks poignantly of the threat posed by Bill 119 to the great tradition of pharmacy in this province. He should know of what he speaks because his family has operated its pharmacy in Belleville for the past 122 years. Mr Geen has several concerns with this legislation which I believe that all members of this chamber should be made aware of. He says in his letter:

"The role of pharmacists has changed enormously over the many years since my grandfather took over the existing drugstore in 1871 and the newly formed college of pharmacy granted him a licence as a chemist and druggist.

"Besides compounding the occasional prescription, we traded in all sorts of things to make a living such as crude bulk chemicals, paints, oils, glass, spices. In 1907 my father graduated with a licence from the college of pharmacy, and in this era many of these former items were discontinued to be replaced by such things as stationery, books, prayer books, patent medicines, office supplies, and more and more cosmetics and a wide range of health and beauty aids, specialty soaps and fragrances imported from Britain. We were a licensed stamp vendor and a wholesale magazine vendor....

"It has always been necessary in a drugstore to have other sources of income to support the dispensing operations. Prescriptions alone cannot cover the heavy overhead, the complex bookkeeping, the high salaries for the pharmacists, the rent, the costly deliveries to the senior citizens, and so on. The successful drugstore makes up for the costly overhead with its wide-range mix of products to entice the customer. Drugstores have become mini department stores, and the drug dispensaries reap the benefit. Today tobacco sales form a stable percentage of the business. In some cases I understand tobacco sales represent 25% of sales. So much for history.

"In all drugstores you will find the tobacco counter at the front, the dispensary counter at the extreme back. In other words the tobacco counter and the dispensary are from 50 to 100 feet apart, and in fact live in different worlds.

"To those who say tobacco should not be sold in pharmacies because it is an addictive drug, I say that is as illogical as saying wine and liquor must not be sold in Liquor Control Board stores because they are addictive. After all, as pharmacists we know all about addictive drugs. That is our profession, that is why we go to university and are granted a licence to dispense drugs. We stand ready to counsel tobacco addicts when they are ready to quit the habit. You won't find drug counsellors in food stores or pool rooms. If pharmacy and tobacco is a questionable mix, food and tobacco is even more so.

"In my three stores, the collective profit from the sales of tobacco is approximately $90,000 which just about equals the wages of seven clerks. Along with the loss of $90,000 goes the loss of profit from all the companion items the customer often purchases at the same time. The loss of all this profit will necessitate reduction of our workforce. At the present time, I employ 81 persons full- and part-time.

"As you well know, pharmacies have been hit by the social contract legislation. Although a referee had recommended a small increase in our former fee of $6.47, the NDP reduced our dispensing fee to $5.85 retroactive to April 1993, and there is no guarantee that it won't be further reduced in 1994. The minimum wage goes up in January 1994 and on top of all of this we are being forced to eliminate the sale of tobacco. I wonder why the NDP government has chosen to pick on pharmacies as their whipping boys." I'm glad the Premier is here to hear that.

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"The Ministry of Health needs economically viable pharmacies for efficient distribution of Ontario drug benefit drugs. Let me summarize what will happen if this nefarious legislation passes:

"(1) The loss of income will certainly place a great many pharmacies in financial jeopardy.

"(2) A large number of jobs will be permanently lost, perhaps as many as 4,000 (1,300 pharmacies who sell tobacco multiplied by three jobs per pharmacy).

"(3) Some smaller pharmacies will just give up the ghost.

"(4) Low morale and bitterness abounds now among the pharmacy staff. We work long hours, are subject to the vagaries of government and bureaucracy and the constant changing of the ODB plan. We have to face the wrath of the public when such changes occur.

"(5) The tobacco addicts we service will look for other sources of supply, some of which are assuredly going to be illegal.

"(6) Minors do not usually patronize drugstores because of our strict interpretation of the age laws, so this legislation will mean nothing to them. They will continue to obtain tobacco wherever they are getting it now.

"(7) The proponents of this legislation will no doubt celebrate having forced the implementation of an unjust and discriminatory legislation in an exceedingly undemocratic manner.

"(8) There will be no difference in the amount of tobacco consumed."

"My business has survived through one fire, two floods, three wars, the Great Depression, and the current recession. We now have to bear the onslaught of an arrogant and oppressive government and we shall endure."

There are a number of other issues with respect to this legislation that need to be examined by the public and by members in the committee hearing process. I'm pleased that the government has agreed to not ram this legislation through all three readings in this session. They have agreed to an open and public debate. In fact, I understand that we may have as much as four weeks of public hearings.

I'm sad to see that the pharmacist profession in particular is being divided by this issue. I hope that when all is said and done, they will be able to unite and to once again speak with a united voice to the government, because pharmacists are being clobbered pretty hard by this government. Their profitability, their ability to make a living at the back of the store in the dispensary has been hit hard by the social contract and by other actions taken by the Ministry of Health and the government of Ontario.

Now the government is saying, "Although 28,000 other stores in the province sell tobacco products, pharmacies, you can't sell tobacco products." We see it as a business issue; we see it as a freedom-of-business issue. In my party's constitution we've enshrined the right to carry on business in a free and democratic society and I cannot support, even though I'm Health critic, the provision of this act which calls on pharmacies to stop, and actually prohibits pharmacies, selling tobacco products.

The college of pharmacy and Ontario Pharmacists' Association have had in place a voluntary ban over the last couple of years to encourage pharmacists to stop selling tobacco. We agree with that ban; pharmacists agree with that ban. I have not had one pharmacist approach me and tell me that he or she disagrees with that voluntary ban. Those pharmacists in my riding, and particularly I think of the town of Collingwood, who have voluntarily stopped selling tobacco products over the last couple of years have done so of their own free will, and they've been able to do so at their own time so that they can bring in a business plan to adjust their businesses to accommodate for the lost sales of tobacco products. It's a freedom-of-business issue.

The vending machine issue is also a freedom-of-business issue and we'll be calling upon the government to compensate vending machine operators who may be put out of business or lose a significant amount of their business as a result of this government deciding to ban the sale of tobacco products from vending machines.

The federal government has very clearly said that it will ban the sale of tobacco products through vending machines in all areas other than licensed premises, in premises where there already is control of those under the age of 19. We agree with the federal legislation and will be calling upon the government to examine closely the provision of this bill which will drive vending machine operators out of business.

I think the government has to learn that these provisions in the bill speak to the issue of jobs. The Premier is here and he has spoken often in this House and I know he tells us that the agenda of his government right now is to maintain jobs and to increase jobs in the province of Ontario.

When the rest of the legislation is pretty good, its intent is good, why throw in this wrench which has got everyone so upset? Why not announce tonight that you're going to take out the provision with respect to pharmacies, take out the provision with respect to vending machines?

I tell you, the bill could go through on the nod, as they say around here. Nobody in his or her right mind as an MPP would simply get up and oppose the other provisions of the bill that are aimed at stopping young people from starting to smoke. Nobody would do that. I assure the minister of that. I'm sure she knows that.

But why, when she had a good thing going for her in terms of this legislation, would she throw in what she knew to be controversial sections? She admitted herself, Mrs Grier did, in the press conference that preceded the announcement of this legislation in this Legislature that it was optics, that the banning of sale of tobacco products in pharmacies was optics.

The government says, "It's intended to send a message to young people that they are not to smoke, that we shouldn't be associating a health facility with the sale of tobacco products and with the habit of smoking." Yet the government has no study and it admits it has no study that actually banning the sale of tobacco products in pharmacies would in any way decrease the consumption or the taking up of the habit by young people. We've challenged the government to bring forward those studies. They admitted in the press conference they don't have those studies.

We've seen in other jurisdictions that it simply isn't the case. You'll drive people who normally don't go to pharmacies anyway, because pharmacies have been pretty good about checking the current age requirements -- who better to trust than your local pharmacist with respect to checking for ID and finding out whether the person is 19 years of age or older? A lot of the stuff in this particular section of the act actually defies the government's own logic, its own language and its own intent of this legislation.

I look forward to the committee hearings. I encourage all the pharmacists in this province to come forward. On no matter what side of the issue they are, we want to hear from them. If they have proof on either side, if they have studies, we want to look at those studies and we want to ensure that the people of this province understand that we see this particular provision as a freedom of business provision.

The Supreme Court has ruled on three occasions now that a government cannot knowingly put a business out of operation. If that is the result of this legislation, there will be court challenges. I again strongly suggest to the government that it remove this controversial provision. Let the bill go through with its good parts and deal with the controversial parts in committee.

The Speaker: I thank the honourable member for Simcoe West for his contribution to the debate and invite any questions and/or comments.

Mrs Margaret Marland (Mississauga South): I would like to commend the member for Simcoe West on his comments on the second reading of Bill 119, An Act to prevent the Provision of Tobacco to Young Persons and to Regulate its Sale and Use by Others. I would like to place on the record -- and I'm very grateful that at this moment both the Minister of Health and the Premier are sitting opposite me on the floor of this House, because I have met with the pharmacists in my riding and all the pharmacists are asking for is a freedom of choice.

I in fact do have pharmacists in my riding who have never sold tobacco products in their stores. However, I have pharmacists who do sell tobacco products and wish to continue, because they feel that prohibiting them from selling tobacco products will in fact not reduce the access to the people about whom we are concerned.

It is my opinion, and I think this is true, that perhaps the management of the sale of tobacco products in a pharmacist's store by responsible staff can sometimes be more of a controlling factor than in the variety store next door where they may not be quite so strict about selling products to people who are under age.

Frankly, I think the pharmacists in this province have been hit hard enough by this government by the reduction in their dispensing fees for the people who are on the Ontario drug benefit plan. There doesn't seem to be any recognition or appreciation by the government for the tremendous capital investment that the pharmacists have to have in order to have all the medications available in stock in their stores. That is a capital outlay for the pharmacists. I'm concerned about this impact on those pharmacists who choose to have the choice of tobacco products or not.

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Mr Peter Kormos (Welland-Thorold): I can tell you that the people down in Welland-Thorold endorse and applaud this initiative by the Minister of Health and regard it as a significant and serious effort to control or inhibit or deter the initiation of a very addictive habit to young people. They're pleased to see this initiative taking place.

At the same time, I've got to tell you this, Mr Speaker, section 7 of the bill is an extremely worrisome thing to the people down in Welland-Thorold as well. People understand the spirit and the intent of the legislation; they've got a hard time understanding outlawing, banning cigarette vending machines and, more important, destroying that small but significant industry, at least to the people who work in it.

Let's understand who cigarette vending people are, at least down in Niagara and Welland-Thorold. I suspect they're similar to rest of the province. They tend to be mom-and-pop operations, they tend to be very small operations and they tend to be people who have invested modest, lifetime savings in a small business, because perhaps employment wasn't available to them in the workforce.

They also tend to employ people who are at the entry level of employment. We're looking at young people and new employees who really don't have much opportunity for other jobs. I tell you, they've invested significant amounts of money lately, some as much as $400 a machine, for instance, when the federal government converted over to loonies.

I've talked to people like the folks down at Export Vending in Port Robinson, Falco Vending in Niagara Falls, Royal Vending in Thorold, Vegas Vending in St Catharines -- there should be some empathy with the government on Vegas Vending -- Dan's Vending in St Catharines, Bestway, Kanes, Murphy Distributing, Lakeshore Vending.

I'm optimistic, because these people have some reasonable solutions to offer to save their businesses, to save the employment they create, yet to maintain the integrity of the legislation. I'm optimistic that the committee will be sympathetic to them and that the committee will give effect to their very rational input.

Mrs Karen Haslam (Perth): I wish I had more time to talk about the young people, because I think that's very important in this legislation, thinking about the young people and the number of 15-year-olds and 11-year-olds and 12-year-olds whom we don't want to start smoking.

My colleague has been talking about pharmacists, and I think it's important to talk about that issue, since that's what he dwelt on today. Pharmacists do in fact back this bill. The request for the legislation came from the pharmacists themselves. There are 2,500 pharmacies in Ontario, and according to the association, 25% of them already do not sell tobacco.

According to the Toronto Star on December 11:

"Pharmacists Back Bill on Tobacco: Pharmacists are health care professionals and as such must make their business the business of health. Clearly, tobacco has no place in our pharmacies."

Again in the Toronto Sun:

"Jim Semchism of the Pharmacists in Support of Bill 119 said it was actually recommended by the Ontario College of Pharmacists in 1991.

"He told a press conference at Queen's Park that business at stores no longer selling tobacco -- some stopped in the 1980s -- has not been harmed."

The health coalition news release from the Ontario Campaign for Action on Tobacco indicates:

"A 1992 Canadian Pharmaceutical Association survey shows that, of 56 pharmacies which eliminated tobacco sales, 59% had either no income loss or an increase in overall sales. Thirteen had marginal losses and seven had moderate losses, but all 20 of the latter claimed to have recouped these losses after almost two years."

I think that's what our colleague was asking us about.

I think the most poignant thing about pharmacies was a letter from A. Eliot of Vancouver about selling tobacco:

"Pharmacist Larry Rosen contends that the removal of tobacco sales from pharmacies would constitute an economic catastrophe for many retailers. He states that 'tobacco has helped significantly'" --

The Speaker: The member's time has expired.

Mrs Haslam: That's a shame, because I really would like to read this letter.

Mr James J. Bradley (St Catharines): It's interesting to see the bill finally in the House of course, because it took the member for Ottawa South, Dalton McGuinty, several tries in this House -- first of all, in statements; second, in questions to the minister -- to stampede the government into finally taking action on this piece of legislation.

I give full credit to Dalton McGuinty for this, because he felt very strongly about this. He asked the questions, he took the time out. I had to bump other people from the question period list just so he could get on to ask his question. Several people here were disappointed that they did not have the opportunity to ask a question, because I thought it was important that Dalton McGuinty have the opportunity to badger the minister into bringing forward progressive legislation.

All of us have met with our local medical officer of health, and the local medical officer of health was wondering, three years after an NDP government, why progressive legislation of this kind would not have been introduced.

Some people said it was the Premier trying to be good to business and not bother business too much, because we know that he associates with the Bay Street types these days and he would not want the business community to be angry with them. But I said I couldn't believe that. I said it just must be an oversight.

I recall when we got the secret list, which was leaked to the opposition, of the government priorities and what they would be introducing in terms of legislation. Did this appear anywhere in the list? No, it did not appear in the list. So thank you, Dalton McGuinty, for doing this for the young people of this province and for improving the health of people in Ontario.

Mr Jim Wilson: My colleague the member for Mississauga South, Mrs Marland, made some very good points with respect to the freedom of choice of pharmacists, again emphasizing what I was saying about the freedom to conduct business in this province, the freedom to sell a legal product without being discriminated against by one's own government.

I know the member for Mississauga South would also like me to put on the record on her behalf that she, along with all of my caucus colleagues, supports the intent of this legislation. I guess what we'll find out during the committee hearings is whether or not the intent, as the government has told us what the intent is, will indeed be the end result of this legislation, whether it will pass the scrutiny it will receive in the weeks of committee hearings coming up.

I thank the member for Welland-Thorold for his comments about vending machines. I know that's a particular concern of his and I appreciate his support with respect to that issue.

The member for St Catharines talks about the member for Ottawa South, Mr McGuinty, bringing forward his private member's bill. I listened the other night when Mr McGuinty spoke in this Legislature about this bill and I want to say it was one of the best debates I've ever heard. It's too bad he's unable to join us tonight. He talked about this bill in the context of all the work he had done. He pointed out the same flaws with it that I'm pointing out tonight, and he even had time to do a few more than I've had. He pointed out that the government may be well intended but it may be misdirected and has not done as much homework as he has actually done on this issue.

I know he'll be spearheading the bill for the Liberal Party. I look forward to working with him on this issue during the committee hearings because he has taken a lot of personal time to explore this issue and I think he's got a lot of wisdom to share with this Legislature. I commend him for his debate the other evening, and I look forward to the committee hearings once again.

Hon Brian A. Charlton (Government House Leader): Mr Speaker, I've had discussions with the opposition House leaders and I'm rising to seek consent to sit past midnight to finish second reading on this bill -- I believe there are a couple of additional members who wish to speak -- and then to finish up the intersession motions and the adjournment motion.

The Speaker: Is there unanimous consent to sit beyond 12 of the clock? Agreed. Further debate?

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Mr D. James Henderson (Etobicoke-Humber): This bill is indeed a milestone bill, a milestone in the supremacy of reason over passion, and a testament, I agree, to the wisdom and foresight of the member for Ottawa South. I commend the government also for taking up this very worthy cause, and I want to say what I mean by a triumph of reason over passion.

When I was in medical school, I recall a pharmacologist lecturing us in 1962 on the harmfulness of smoking and the link of smoking with lung cancer, chronic bronchitis and a variety of other respiratory diseases, heart attack and strokes and a number of other less frequent vascular and other illnesses. But what I remember most clearly from that pharmacologist was his protest during that lecture in 1962 that all of the scientific evidence had been in for more than a quarter of a century and that very little had yet been done.

It is now 1993, and a lot has been done, yet still too little. This bill takes another small step. Although there are sections of it that I find repugnant, and although my heart goes out to the inevitable small number of people who are injured by any progressive piece of legislation -- and I'm thinking of pharmacists and of course of Ontario's hard-pressed tobacco farmers -- this is a good bill, and I will support it, with the proviso that we strengthen programs to assist Ontario's tobacco farmers and be sensitive to the needs of our pharmacists in Ontario.

The contents of this bill are by now well known. The Ontario tobacco act raises the legal age for smoking to 19 and prohibits the sale of tobacco in hospitals. Also, it prohibits the sale of tobacco in psychiatric facilities, nursing homes, pharmacies and a variety of other facilities. It imposes health warnings to be included in the packaging of tobacco products and mandates that vendors of tobacco products must post health warnings. It bans vending machines that sell tobacco products and bans smoking in a variety of facilities. The penalties for violation of this act are substantial. The bill says nothing about Ontario's tobacco farmers. For the purposes of this bill, they do not exist.

I want to begin my discussion of there measures by quoting not a pharmacologist but a pharmacist. I do so not intending to imply that pharmacists across Ontario are unanimously or even necessarily generally in support of Bill 119. I know a number are very distressed about it. Yet some pharmacists are in support, and I want to quote them.

Jim Semchism, a past president of the Ontario Pharmacists' Association, puts the matter rather directly. "Pharmacies," he says, "are health care facilities. In addition, pharmacists are health care professionals and as such must make their business the business of health. Our role is to ensure the safe and effective use of medications to promote health and to prevent disease. Clearly, tobacco has no place in our pharmacies."

An impressive group of pharmacists flesh out his remarks. Their numbers include three former presidents of the Ontario College of Pharmacists, two former presidents of the Ontario Pharmacists' Association, the executive director of the Canadian Pharmaceutical Association, the dean and acting dean of the faculty of pharmacy at a prominent Ontario university, a former registrar of the Ontario College of Pharmacists and of course several other prominent hospital and community pharmacists.

That group defines four basic objectives. First, they support the request made in 1981 by the Ontario College of Pharmacists for legislation to stop the sale of tobacco products in Ontario pharmacies. Second, they support the passage of Bill 119, this Tobacco Control Act. Third, they want to be sure that Ontarians know that many pharmacies in this province have already removed tobacco products from their stores and others have never sold tobacco products. Fourth, they want to tell Ontarians that there is a fundamental conflict when pharmacists, as health care professionals, sell tobacco products.

This bill speaks of banning the sale of tobacco products from health care facilities. Certainly, pharmacies are health care facilities and pharmacists are health care professionals.

To store owners who protest that the loss of tobacco sale revenue will injure our pharmacies, while one must be sensitive to that view and sensitive to their feelings, one must say also, as the member for Perth pointed out, that the evidence for that is not overwhelming. From the 1992 survey compiled by the Canadian Pharmaceutical Association, of 56 pharmacies which eliminated tobacco sales, 13 had suffered marginal financial losses, seven had suffered moderate financial loses, but all 20 claimed to have recouped those losses within less than two years.

Some members may wonder why I make this point so strongly echoing the views of some Ontario pharmacists. It is not because they are necessarily a majority viewpoint among pharmacists; I don't even know if they are and frankly it doesn't matter to me. I am quoting these pharmacists extensively because they put the argument so very clearly and so very well and I think it is high time that we swallowed whatever hardship may be imposed by really discouraging smoking as a number one killer of Ontarians and went the distance to do whatever we can as legislators to discourage this habit.

As a physician -- a physician, incidentally, who spent a little time on the pathology service of a teaching hospital in an Ontario university -- I can speak of personal experience in this area. I have looked after patients who were dying of lung cancer or other chest disease and I have known and felt their suffering. I spent a period of time on the pathology service of a hospital not far from Toronto and I have inspected and dissected the lungs of smokers and compared them to the lungs of non-smokers.

I think that everybody should have that experience because the evidence is grim. The lungs of non-smokers are pink, fluffy and spongy. The lungs of smokers are blackened, heavy and sometimes studded with black specks or nodules which are a grim reminder of the awful damage that tobacco byproducts can visit upon human bodies. I think that any ordinary citizen who visited the pathology department of an Ontario hospital and inspected the lungs of smokers and compared them to the lungs of non-smokers would find that experience alone sufficient to discourage them from ever taking up the habit of smoking.

These observations are not confined to my experience and are certainly not limited to recent observation. Physicians for literally centuries have seen the lungs of smokers and compared them in hospital autopsy rooms with the lungs of non-smokers and offered grim warnings about the consequences of smoking. Scientists for at least three quarters of a century, probably more, have substantiated those warnings with hard scientific data.

The lag time in translating what scientists know into what our communities practise in this area has been tragically prolonged. It is only in the last couple of decades that we have really begun to make substantial strides in controlling and ultimately discouraging the use of tobacco products. I think it's relevant to note the presence of Gar Mahood and Michael Perley in the gallery, who have led the fight in many ways for effective legislation and effective action on a series of occasions.

If anything, this bill can be criticized as too little -- too little, too late. Just limiting where tobacco products can be bought and by whom they can be bought and where they can be smoked may not do enough to deter children and teens from taking up this habit. Those who want to will simply find out where they can be bought, find a qualified person to buy them for them if they have to, and smoke where they can or where enforcement is lax. I don't want to speculate about black-marketed tobacco products but it is hard not to think of that as well.

What I would like to see is a widespread, large-scale education and prevention campaign to discourage smokers from smoking and to help and assist those smokers who want to end the habit, but especially I would like to strengthen our preventive and educative measures so that we can join together in a frontal assault on tobacco use.

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In fairness, the government does speak of a province-wide education program to be launched about now and speaks of a little over $3 million to fund that program and I think that initiative is laudable, but still insufficient. I applaud the effort and I regret only that it does not go further.

I hope also that we can spend a little time in the course of tracking this legislation through the committee process thinking about the plight of Ontario's tobacco farmers. They have been a productive and reliable part of the economy of this province, they have been conscientious employers and creators of jobs and they have been reliable taxpayers. They do not deserve to be ignored. We must do more to help them and perhaps there will be opportunities during the committee hearings for people to come forward and say what more can be done to assist this beleaguered sector of Ontario's economy.

As I move towards conclusion, I want to note that one in five preventable deaths among adults in Ontario can be attributed to smoking. Tobacco-related diseases are Ontario's number one public health problem because, in addition to those deaths that I already mentioned, an incredible burden of suffering, illness and disability can be attributed to the use of tobacco. More than 13,000 Ontarians die each year from tobacco use, almost five times as many as die from traffic accidents, suicide and AIDS all combined. One Ontarian dies from tobacco use every 40 minutes in Ontario. That's about three during the course of this debate right here this evening.

More men die of lung cancer in Ontario than any other cancer and 80% of those lung cancers are caused by tobacco use. More than 1,000 Ontario women die each year from lung cancer caused by tobacco use, and lung cancer rates for women have tripled in the last 20 years. Lung cancer killed almost as many women as breast cancer. Mothers who smoke during pregnancy are more likely to have low-birth-weight babies. Those data are shocking.

True, we have made progress. From 1966 to 1990, the number of Ontarians using tobacco has declined by about a third. For some reason, the decline is not equal between the sexes. For men in the last quarter century, the drop has been about 40%, whereas for women it has been about 15%. We need strong measures. So there is much to be dissatisfied with in this legislation, yet also much to praise.

Science is a wonderful thing. When the findings of science can be turned to some commercial purpose or some entrepreneurial purpose, we embrace science with enthusiasm and we proclaim ourselves to be the allies of science. When those conditions aren't met, when the findings of science don't serve a commercial or entrepreneurial purpose, when they reflect on our habits as individuals and as citizens, we aren't so quick. We have neglected too long what science has been telling us about smoking for nearly a century.

I will support this bill because it is another step in the right direction. I would like to see bigger and bolder steps, but let's take the measures of Bill 119, proclaim them and build them into a frontal assault on the use of tobacco as a deadly killer in the province of Ontario.

The Speaker: I thank the honourable member for Etobicoke-Humber for his contribution to the debate and invite questions and/or comments.

Mr Robert V. Callahan (Brampton South): I am a smoker and the only thing that I would care to see is that if there is this concern for smoking, which is an addiction -- it's the same as alcohol. We provide treatment centres for people with alcohol addictions; there is also available, as we all know, a medical treatment for tobacco use. Why is there not money made available through whatever program, be it through OHIP or whatever, to provide opportunities for people who are seriously addicted to the use of cigarettes?

I can't dispute the facts that my friend has put forward and others have put forward, but if we are concerned about the fact that our young people and those people who are adults are suffering and dying from this disease, then there should in fact be some assistance monetarily in terms of using the best medical technology we have to attempt to eliminate that habit.

I have to say that raising the age from 18 to 19, I find it somewhat difficult to understand how you're going to police that. We placed in the hands of the small corner store owners the question of dealing with lotteries, and my friend the member for Mississauga West had to in fact introduce a bill to prevent 16-year-olds or younger from spending their lunch money on gambling. How have you not placed a further burden on them to police this? Should it be their obligation or should it in fact be an obligation that's pursued by a government that intends to pursue and to overcome this difficult problem?

I must say that I agree with the member for Etobicoke-Humber that in fact this bill may go a small step towards dealing with this problem, but if realistically we want to make sure that the next generation doesn't get hooked like I got hooked and like many other adults out there got hooked, then we have to find some further solution that's going to deal with that.

Mrs Haslam: I would like to quote from that letter to the Toronto Star from A. Eliot of Vancouver.

"Pharmacist Larry Rosen contends that the removal of tobacco sales from pharmacies would constitute an economic catastrophe for many retailers. He states that 'tobacco has helped significantly in generating customer traffic, which in turn has led to the sale of many other drugstore products.'

"Having recently buried my father, after watching him gradually die of lung cancer, I can confirm the truth of Mr Rosen's statement. After years of tobacco purchases from the local drugstore, my father was eventually able to extend his custom to the pharmaceutical section, where he found it necessary to purchase drugs such as codeine and morphine in ever increasing quantities.

"In such cases, with tobacco sales from the front cash desk, and drug sales from the back counter, pharmacies are indeed the economic gainers at both ends."

Fully 90% of current smokers start before the age of 20. By the age of 11, one in five has tried smoking at least once. By the age of 15, 22% of boys and 29% of girls are regular or occasional smokers.

It would be easy if we could go into the education system and explain the realities to youth. But, as my teenagers have said to me: "I'm young, so don't tell me I'm going to die. It's doesn't mean that much to me."

I found very interesting a letter to the editor of the Globe and Mail on March 10, 1993. This was by Mark Taylor, who is president of Physicians for a Smoke-Free Canada. He wrote from Halifax. He stated that they took a survey: 23% of 15-year-old students smoke daily in Nova Scotia. They asked students aged 12 to 19 what they knew about the effects of tobacco on the health of smokers. Of those who smoke every day, 91% knew that tobacco caused lung cancer and 80% knew that it caused heart disease. But the education didn't help in those cases.

Mr Drummond White (Durham Centre): My friend the member for Etobicoke-Humber depicts very graphically the blackened lungs and the deaths, the 13,000 deaths that my friend the member for Durham-York mentioned. I smoked myself for some 24 years, up until about six weeks ago.

It's easy for us to deny it, and those kids who start smoking now deny the risks they're involved in. They deny it and they stop smoking with great difficulty in their teens, and even more so in their 30s and 40s. When we hear about the plight of the pharmacists, when we hear about the problems of tobacco sales, we forget and we deny the awesome fact of those 13,000 people who die horrible deaths and those many, many people who are smokers whose activities are curtailed and who inflict that second-hand smoke upon those around them. That denial goes on and on.

It is important that this legislation creates an atmosphere around us that says tobacco smoking is no longer as acceptable as it was -- it doesn't stop it, but it's no longer as acceptable as it was -- and it creates an environment where youngsters in high school will not be starting to smoke, where they will know full well and hopefully will not engage in that habit.

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The Speaker: Further questions and/or comments? The honourable member for Etobicoke-Humber has up to two minutes for his reply.

Mr Henderson: I want to thank those who have commented on my remarks. The point that I want to emphasize in all of this is, why has it taken so long? We have known for centuries what havoc is wreaked by tobacco on human health; we've known scientifically for nearly a century; scientists, physicians and health care advocates have been telling us for half a century. Why this lag between what we know, what our scientists tell us, what we know as a society and what we practise, what we do?

One could find that lag to be a fascinating subject for scholarly inquiry. If I were a philosopher, I might take that interest. I think much more, though, it's a matter of urgent public health concern that we address ourselves to the evidence, that we wake up to the findings of scientists in this area and that we translate those findings into action.

When scientists told us about venereal disease, we acted. When scientists have been telling us about AIDS, we have acted. When scientists told us about the relation of obesity and lack of fitness to heart disease, a lot of people acted. When scientists told us about the relationship of type A personality to heart disease, we even tried to act there and convert ourselves, some of us, into laid-back type Bs, and that is a very difficult thing to do.

For some reason, in the area of smoking we're very, very slow to take up what we know as a society, turn it into effective programs of public health and really make a difference. This bill takes a step in that direction and that's why I think it should be supported.

The Speaker: Is there further debate? The member for Carleton.

Mr Sean G. Conway (Renfrew North): Speaking of the new puritans.

Mr Norman W. Sterling (Carleton): New? I cannot be accused of being new to this issue. On December 5, 1985, I introduced my first bill, an act to protect the public with regard to second-hand smoke, called Bill 71. That was introduced long before this issue became a popular political thing to do. Quite frankly, a lot of my colleagues looked at me and said, "Norm, are you crazy?" I replied, "Maybe I am and maybe I'm not."

As a former member who just spoke on this issue said, this issue goes back to 1975 when the World Health Organization said that of all the illnesses we have in society the one that we could prevent as legislators, as governments, across our whole globe was the whole addictive habit of smoking. They recognized that as far back as 1975 and here we are in 1993 still dealing with that issue. I think that is a sorry state as a connection between science, health, evidence and in fact legislative action.

I'm not blaming this government for not taking some action, because I am supportive of looking into its efforts with regard to attempting to cut back on this particular addictive habit. I'm not certain this bill will do it, but I am willing to look at it constructively and willing to try to seek the best possible combination in order to protect some of our people in the future.

On April 22, 1986, Bill 71 received second reading. I don't think that any member of this Legislature had before or has since ever taken a matter to the public as I did, because I tried a different tack as a legislator, one of the things that other members might try to do in order to gain public support behind them, because at that point in time, in 1986, there wasn't a lot of support behind what I was doing. There were organizations like Garfield Mahood's non-smokers' protection association, and I notice him here still pushing this with his people towards a successful conclusion.

I took out an ad in the Toronto Star and a lot of the daily newspapers and I said to people, "Will you write a petition supporting what I am doing?"

Mr Bradley: How did you pay for the ad?

Mr Sterling: I asked them for some money to pay for the ad. It was amazing. What happened was I not only collected enough money to pay for all of the ads -- I sent the excess, which was about $2,000, to the Canadian Cancer Society and the Heart and Stroke Foundation -- but I also collected the names of 30,000 people across the province, unorganized, to support what I was doing with regard to this issue. Then, as we travelled through the latter parts of the 1980s, I introduced another number of bills.

I notice the member for Hamilton West is here tonight, the Honourable Richard Allen, who was also interested in this issue and introduced a bill as well. His particular bill dealt with vending machines, and we're dealing with that in this legislation. I think he should deserve some credit for bringing that issue to the fore, because that was part of it.

As we have built over the period of time, my particular concern was to deal with the issue of second-hand smoke in the workplace and in the public place, because I felt that if in fact the issue of smoking was dealt with in a social sense, that if in fact people gained respect for other people's environment, for their air, eventually the habit of smoking would become socially unacceptable.

Now, I understand the addictive nature of tobacco as well.

Mr Conway: Did you ever smoke, Norm?

Mr Sterling: I don't like smoking, but I do like a lot of people who do smoke. I don't like smoking, but I understand that some people make their living from tobacco, from producing tobacco, from manufacturing tobacco.

But the Premier was at that time a member of another political party in opposition, and I can remember that on one of my private member's bills -- I think there were six from 1985 to 1989 or 1990 -- he came in and, as the leader of the New Democratic Party, spoke in support of one of my bills. I appreciated that as a private member because it was part of the public support behind this whole concern about the deadly effects of tobacco. I think his words at that time were, "You know, there are a lot of problems associated with this, but the fact of the matter is that tobacco is a deadly, deadly problem," and we continue on with that deadly, deadly problem.

We have 13,000 people who die prematurely each year in this province as a result of tobacco. That means about 35 people a day. I keep talking about that in daily terms. I mean, if we had a bus run off the road and 35 people were killed as a result of that accident, that would be headline news across the province of Ontario. But that's happening each and every day of every year in Ontario as a result of the use of tobacco. That's a fact, and nobody can deny that fact.

Therefore, as we move along the road trying to control or help people get away from the addiction of tobacco -- and it's a very difficult addiction to get away from. For some people, as explained to me by some of the researchers at the Addiction Research Foundation, for the bottom third, it's fairly easy. For the middle third it's relatively hard and for the top third it's absolutely almost impossible for them to get off the addiction of tobacco. Whatever they try, they can't get off it.

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The whole problem or the whole thrust of our efforts at getting at the young people is so, so important, because I don't know what third my kids fall in. I don't know whether they're in the top third of the very addictive kind of person who could never get off it once they were on it or they're in the bottom third where they could either choose to smoke or choose not to smoke.

We have trouble in my party with the part dealing with the pharmacy. I have trouble with it, quite frankly, because we just came through an experience dealing with Sunday shopping and we were talking about pharmacy: what is not a pharmacy, what is a pharmacy. I get concerned when we get into a regulatory area we cannot enforce and we are going to perhaps deal with people who are going to try to get around this legislation in various and nefarious and different methods. That is one concern I have with it.

I've got to tell you the other concern I have with it is that I would rather have a pharmacy selling tobacco than some of the other retail outlets which might sell tobacco, because I think that it is a more controlled environment, that perhaps there is a greater concern over selling to minors than there is in other kinds of retail establishments. That may be right or wrong, but that is my personal feeling about that particular issue.

I don't want to speak long. I guess perhaps I have gone on for about 10 minutes now. I cannot help but be involved in this kind of debate. I want to say that we have been looking for this kind of legislation for a period of time. I congratulate the member for Ottawa South for bringing some legislation forward. It does not surprise me. I was tempted to do the same. However, I knew the minister was probably going to bring this legislation on.

I was a little disappointed, Madam Minister, that you didn't bring forward stricter legislation dealing with smoking in the workplace and also dealing with smoking in the public place on a provincial level rather than on a sporadic municipal level, as we have across the province at this time.

People who go to a restaurant in Toronto or in Hamilton or in Ottawa can be assured that there is a non-smoking section, but if they go to some of our smaller-populated municipalities which do not have the sophistication to create the bylaws, to deal with smoking in public places bylaws, those non-smoking citizens of our province do not have the opportunity to go to a restaurant and enjoy a meal without smoking in the particular area where they're eating.

I just wanted to put those on record. My caucus has decided to support this bill on second reading. We look forward to the committee hearings on it. We will act in a constructive way during those hearings. We do hope the minister will listen to the arguments about the pharmacy argument.

We are concerned that perhaps the government is overstepping its boundaries in terms of controlling that area and we think that should be either voluntary or controlled by the College of Pharmacists, because the issue is not only one of people who claim they are health care workers, but they are also in fact retailers. I think there are some good arguments on both sides of the issue and I only hope the government has an open mind to both sides of that argument before coming to a final determination on that.

The Speaker: I thank the honourable member for Carleton for his contribution to the debate and invite any questions and/or comments.

Hon Frances Lankin (Minister of Economic Development and Trade): I want to say thank you to the member for Carleton and the member for Hamilton West and other members in this Legislature who have shown leadership on this issue over the years in bringing it forward to the legislative arena. I'm sure I share with them what must be a sense of satisfaction and pleasure at seeing this legislation come forward and seeing some progress being brought to this issue.

I might just on reflection say to the member for Carleton that I note that for years he fought to see this in legislation when he was a member of a party in government and through the period of another government, and here we are and I'm pleased to be part of a government that is delivering on this.

I would mention to him, just in thinking about it, also his progressive work on areas of living will and how he wanted to see that in legislation during the time that he was in a party that was in government, and here this government has enacted that and has done it.

If I might mention, for a number of years he was working on the issue of Quebec-Ontario trade and wanted to see government take tough action. I point out to him that through that period of time and as time has elapsed this government has finally taken action.

Perhaps those are things he might want to reflect on over the intersession. I would always say that there's room on this side of the House and we seem to share a lot and we seem to be able to bring legislative action to a number of the member's priorities.

Let me say, on the issue of the legislation in front of us, how important it is for us to be able to move in such a concrete way to demonstrate the importance of health promotion initiatives, to demonstrate the importance of the shift from illness treatment to illness prevention. There is no clearer issue of health promotion and illness prevention that we can address than the issue of helping to create an atmosphere that stops kids from getting addicted to tobacco.

I'm thrilled to see this legislation coming forward. I look forward to the debate in public hearings and to the development of a good piece of public policy, a good piece of legislation coming from that which will have a real impact on our health care system and on the health of our population, the health of our kids and their future.

Mr Conway: Mr Speaker, I just want to say something nice about my friend from Manotick because, you know, Normie has a certain irrepressible charm, and for a long time he has sponsored a number of interesting causes.

Mr Mahoney: It's 12:30 on the 15th.

Mr Conway: I know the hour is late, but for those of us who have been around a while, we remember, like the Treasurer -- you know, Normie fought Roy McMurtry, unhappily and unsuccessfully, on the issues of freedom of information, but he's really been a loyalist to this cause.

When I hear him in full flight on this kind of a subject, I'm reminded of that old navy call, "I don't smoke, drink or chew, or hang around with people who do." Normie's that kind of a guy, you know. He has been a very powerful advocate on this case over, now, many years. Those of us who live beside him up in the Ottawa Valley have always been impressed by his dedication to this cause.

I don't smoke, and I certainly support the government in this respect. I have some problems about certain particulars, but I think those can be ironed out. But, you know, private members often wrestle with their worth in this place. I've not been one who has sponsored very much private legislation; I just can't get into it. But Normie has and, boy, he's been a real passionate crusader against the evil of the weed. Tonight we celebrate his commitment to that cause and I just have to tip my hat to him.

The Speaker: Further questions and/or comments? If not, the member for Carleton has up to two minutes for his reply.

Mr Sterling: It's pretty hard to respond to all of that. I just want to assure all the residents of the riding of Carleton, I ain't quittin' for an appointment right yet.

Mr Conway: Oh, all right.

The Speaker: Is there further debate? If not, the member for Durham-York with wrapup comments.

Mr Larry O'Connor (Durham-York): In closing up this debate, I want to thank all those who have participated in the second reading debate. I'm sure we're going to have a very lively discussion around this issue. I think it's one that deserves full consultation around the province and I think that's going to happen. I want to thank the visitors we've had from the coalitions who have spent this evening, at this hour, to be here with us to hear the second reading debate and then move its second reading.

The Speaker: Mr O'Connor has moved second reading of Bill 119. Is it the pleasure of the House that the motion carry? Carried. Shall the bill be ordered for third reading?

Hon Mr Charlton: Social development committee.

The Speaker: The social development committee? So ordered.

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Hon Mr Charlton: I have several motions that deal with the intersession and then the adjournment of the House which I need the consent of the House to move.

The Speaker: Agreed? Agreed.

REFERRAL OF BILL 62

Hon Brian A. Charlton (Government House Leader): First, I move that the order of the House dated April 22, 1993, referring Bill 62, An Act to amend the Environmental Protection Act in respect of the Niagara Escarpment, to the standing committee on resources development be rescinded and that Bill 62 be referred to the standing committee on administration of justice.

The Speaker (Hon David Warner): Is it the pleasure of the House that the motion carry? Carried.

COMMITTEE SITTINGS

Hon Brian A. Charlton (Government House Leader): I move that the following committees be authorized to meet during the winter adjournment in accordance with the schedule of meeting dates agreed to by the three party House leaders and tabled with the Clerk of the Assembly to examine and inquire into the following matters:

Standing committee on administration of justice for eight days to consider Bill 3, An Act to provide for Access to Information relating to the affairs of Teranet Land Information Services Inc., and Bill 20, An Act to protect the Persons, Property and Rights of Tenants and Landlords, and Bill 62, An Act to amend the Environmental Protection Act in respect of the Niagara Escarpment;

Standing committee on finance and economic affairs for four days to consider the matter of the underground economy and for eight days for pre-budget consultation;

Standing committee on general government for 16 days of public hearings and four days of clause-by-clause consideration of Bill 120, An Act to amend certain statutes concerning residential property, and for four days to consider Bill 21, An Act to amend certain Acts with respect to Land Leases, and Bill 95, An Act to provide for the passing of vital services by-laws by the City of North York;

Standing committee on government agencies for two days each month that the House does not meet to review intended appointments and for 12 days to consider the operation of certain agencies, boards and commissions of the government of Ontario as provided in its terms of reference;

Standing committee on the Legislative Assembly for a period of time agreed by the three party House leaders to consider the matter of the appointment of the Environmental Commissioner and to report to the House its recommended candidate for appointment as the Environmental Commissioner and for eight days to consider the Municipal Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act;

Standing committee on public accounts for 12 days to consider sections 3.04, 3.05, 3.07, 3.08, 3.17 of the 1993 Annual Report of the Provincial Auditor and to consider changes to the accounting methods of the government of Ontario;

Standing committee on resources development for eight days of public hearings and four days of clause-by-clause to consider Bill 123, An Act respecting the Construction Industry Workforce;

Standing committee on social development for 12 days of public hearings and four days of clause-by-clause consideration of Bill 119, An Act to prevent the Provision of Tobacco to Young Persons and to Regulate its Sale and Use by Others;

And that with the agreement of the House leaders of each recognized party, the time allotted and matters specified for consideration by the committees may be amended.

The Speaker (Hon David Warner): Is it the pleasure of the House that the motion carry? Carried.

COMMITTEE REPORTS

Hon Brian A. Charlton (Government House Leader): I move that committees be authorized to release reports during the winter adjournment by depositing a copy of any report with the Clerk of the Assembly, and upon the resumption of the meetings of the House the Chairs of such committees shall bring any such reports before the House in accordance with the standing orders.

The Speaker (Hon David Warner): Is it the pleasure of the House that the motion carry? Carried.

SPRING MEETING

Hon Brian A. Charlton (Government House Leader): Lastly and finally, I move that when the House adjourns today, it shall stand adjourned until 1:30 pm on Monday, March 21, 1994.

The Speaker (Hon David Warner): Is it the pleasure of the House that the motion carry? Carried.

This House stands adjourned -- sorry?

Mr Norman W. Sterling (Carleton): On a point of order, Mr Speaker: I'd just like to wish the member for Stormont, Dundas and Glengarry and East Grenville a happy 10th anniversary tomorrow, December 15, on his election to this Legislative Assembly.

Hon Mr Charlton: I move the adjournment of the House.

The Speaker: Is it the pleasure of the House that the motion carry? Carried.

This House stands adjourned until 1:30 of the clock, Monday, March 21, 1994.

The House adjourned at 0038.

December 14, 1993

WINDSOR TEACHERS DISPUTE SETTLEMENT ACT, 1993 / LOI DE 1993 SUR LE RÈGLEMENT DU CONFLIT DES ENSEIGNANTS DE WINDSOR

TEACHERS' PENSION AMENDMENT ACT, 1993 / LOI DE 1993 MODIFIANT LA LOI SUR LE RÉGIME DE RETRAITE DES ENSEIGNANTS

ALL-WOOD LAND CLEARING LTD ACT, 1993

GROUPE CONCORDE INC. ACT, 1993

UKRAINIAN PEOPLE'S HOME IN PRESTON ACT, 1993

REPRESENTATION AMENDMENT ACT, 1993 / LOI DE 1993 MODIFIANT LA LOI SUR LA REPRÉSENTATION ÉLECTORALE

ENVIRONMENTAL BILL OF RIGHTS, 1993 / CHARTE DES DROITS ENVIRONNEMENTAUX DE 1993

EDUCATION AMENDMENT ACT, 1993 / LOI DE 1993 MODIFIANT LA LOI SUR L'ÉDUCATION

CONCURRENCE IN SUPPLY

SUPPLY ACT, 1993 / LOI DE CRÉDITS DE 1993

HIGHWAY TRAFFIC AMENDMENT ACT (DIMENSIONS AND WEIGHT), 1993 / LOI DE 1993 MODIFIANT LE CODE DE LA ROUTE (DIMENSIONS ET POIDS)

HIGHWAY TRAFFIC AMENDMENT ACT (NOVICE DRIVERS), 1993 / LOI DE 1993 MODIFIANT LE CODE DE LA ROUTE (CONDUCTEURS DÉBUTANTS)

COUNTY OF SIMCOE ACT, 1993 / LOI DE 1993 SUR LE COMTÉ DE SIMCOE

PUBLIC SERVICE AND LABOUR RELATIONS STATUTE LAW AMENDMENT ACT, 1993 / LOI DE 1993 MODIFIANT DES LOIS EN CE QUI CONCERNE LA FONCTION PUBLIQUE ET LES RELATIONS DE TRAVAIL

ROYAL ASSENT / SANCTION ROYALE

TOBACCO CONTROL ACT, 1993 / LOI DE 1993 SUR LA RÉGLEMENTATION DE L'USAGE DU TABAC

REFERRAL OF BILL 62

COMMITTEE SITTINGS

COMMITTEE REPORTS

SPRING MEETING