Hansard Transcript 1997-Sept-23 vol. a | Legislative Assembly of Ontario

M. Jean-Marc Lalonde (Prescott et Russell) : J'aimerais porter à l'attention du ministre de la Santé deux incidents qui sont survenus récemment dans ma circonscription.

Tout d'abord le cas de M^me Thérèse Martin de Rockland, qui a fait un arrêt cardiaque et qui a dû être réanimée à plusieurs reprises par les ambulanciers. Dès son arrivée à la salle d'urgence de l'hôpital Montfort, tout le personnel médical affirmait que M^me Martin n'aurait pas survécu si le transport par ambulance avait été prolongé d'une dizaine de minutes pour se rendre à l'hôpital général d'Ottawa.

Le 17 août dernier, M^me Cécile Labrèche de Clarence était impliquée dans un accident sur la route 17. Lors du transport par ambulance vers l'hôpital général d'Ottawa, la condition de M^me Labrèche inquiétait parce qu'elle souffre d'angine. L'ambulancier qui se dirigeait vers l'hôpital général d'Ottawa a dû modifier son parcours afin de se rendre à la salle d'urgences la plus près, soit à l'hôpital Montfort.

Dans ces deux cas, Monsieur le Ministre, il est possible que les deux patientes ne seraient plus de ce monde s'il avait fallu prolonger le transport par ambulance d'une dizaine de minutes pour se rendre à l'hôpital général d'Ottawa. À la lueur de ces faits, je demande donc au ministre de la Santé de reconsidérer la recommandation de fermer la salle d'urgences de l'hôpital Montfort.

NORTH BAY DAYS OF ACTION

Ms Frances Lankin (Beaches-Woodbine): Today is the second day of the North Bay Days of Action and organizers say that we are poised to see the largest demonstration ever in northern Ontario on Saturday.

Lana Mitchell, who is one of the co-chairs and who also heads up Low Income People Involvement of Nipissing, expects a large turnout of people from North Bay. As she says: "Our neighbours know at first hand that the community of North Bay has suffered devastating losses. Already, requests to the Santa Fund are far ahead of what they were last year. Food bank usage is increasing every month. This community knows we have to recognize some unpleasant realities. It will turn out in large numbers."

The organizers have also made a real focus on unemployment and job loss in North Bay. Dawson Pratt, one of the other co-chairs, indicates that over 1,000 jobs have vanished because of this government's policies. The North Bay population is 56,000. If a proportionate number of people lost their jobs in Metro Toronto, almost 43,000 people would be jobless.

Pratt has called on the government to set up a select committee or a provincial inquiry to look into the devastation of jobs and the job loss in the Nipissing area. I think we can agree with him and say that if this same degree of job loss occurred in Metro Toronto, an army of 43,000 unemployed would certainly get the government's attention.

We support them in their call for a provincial inquiry and we'll be there on Saturday to show that support.

GREATER PETERBOROUGH CHAMBER OF COMMERCE

Mr R. Gary Stewart (Peterborough): Today I rise to inform all members of this House that the city of Peterborough has declared this week the Greater Peterborough Chamber of Commerce Week. This special designation is a reflection of the important role the local chamber of commerce plays in our community. The chamber and the community have long had a close working relationship, and this week that partnership will develop further through a series of week-long events.

Computer workshops involving participants of the Student Connection program have been scheduled. Students from Trent University and Sir Sandford Fleming College will provide local businesses with training in how to use the Internet to expand their businesses: Good for business, good for students.

Later in the week, the chamber will host a special business awards reception to honour individuals who have experienced successes in one form or another.

The Greater Peterborough Chamber of Commerce is involved in many positive initiatives, everything from charity fund-raisers to working on initiatives to improve working conditions through the Safe Communities project, which is a program designed to reduce workplace accidents and injuries: Good for workers, good for business, good for government.

I invite all members to join me in congratulating our local chamber of commerce and all its members for the positive contributions they have made to the people of Peterborough.

ASSISTANCE TO FLOOD VICTIMS

Mr Bruce Crozier (Essex South): I rise today once again to speak about the plight of the flood victims of Essex and Kent counties. On numerous occasions in past months I've stood in this Legislature and asked the Minister of Municipal Affairs to assist the citizens of Essex county who experienced property damage in the millions of dollars.

Once again, I ask the Minister of Municipal Affairs why he is sitting on his hands when he knows the situation is critical. The threat of fall storms and high lake levels further damaging breakwalls is now a reality. What is the minister waiting for? Is he waiting for the residents of Lake Erie and Lake St Clair to suffer further property damage?

This situation can be rectified right here, right now, if the Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing would simply move to reinstate funding to the Shoreline Property Assistance Act. As I've stated on various occasions, we're not talking about a handout. It's not a grant, it's a loan. Why this government has refused to assist the citizens of Essex is difficult to understand. They've offered no explanations for this delay or refusal of responsibility.

Premier Harris, if your minister still refuses to take action, I call on you to personally intervene in this situation in response to the lack of support the shoreline property owners have received to date so that damaged property and breakwalls can be repaired promptly. The citizens of Essex need the help of their government now. Again, I urge the minister to provide assistance that is required immediately.

EDUCATION FINANCING

Mr Tony Silipo (Dovercourt): Yesterday we saw the Minister of Education unveil his latest attack on our school system. He, of course, put it as he usually does, in a context very different than what the reality out there is going to be. He talked about the need and the wish to increase the school year, the need to give parents more authority through the increase and expansion of the rights that they have through the parent councils. But we know and people out there know that what this is all about is cutting another $1 billion out of our school system.

I want to tell the Minister of Education and I want to tell this government that people out there are not fooled by the antics of this government and certainly not by the approach taken by the Minister of Education. Last week I was at a meeting in my constituency at one of the high schools in the area, Oakwood Collegiate. Two hundred parents and students joined the teachers at a meeting to discuss what was coming up, the impending teachers strikes that we may see across the province and certainly here in Metropolitan Toronto.

Overwhelmingly, people there understood that what this minister and this government are doing is an outright attack on our school system. They see that if teachers are forced into a strike position, it will be because the government will have forced them into such an action and it will be because teachers will be defending not their own pocketbooks but the system of education that we have built up in this province, which certainly can be improved but will not be improved and will be wasted even more so by another $1 billion --

The Speaker (Hon Chris Stockwell): Statements.

ERNIE LAROCQUE

Mr Garry J. Guzzo (Ottawa-Rideau): I'm pleased to rise today on behalf of the MPP for Stormont-Dundas-Glengarry and East Grenville to pay tribute to one Ernie Larocque, who is a constituent of Noble Villeneuve. Officer Larocque is here in the members' gallery today. He became the first Canadian ever to win the annual international truck inspection competition held this year in Minneapolis, Minnesota. What this means is that Ontario has the best enforcement officer inspecting trucks and buses in North America and, more importantly, he's working out of the ministry office in Cornwall.

Our government has been a tireless advocate for road safety. In the past two years we've introduced legislation that targets unsafe trucks and drivers. However, it's people like Officer Larocque who have to conduct these inspections, making certain drivers have proper papers, that their tires and brakes are in working order. Knowing that we have someone of Officer Larocque's calibre working on our behalf should be a source of satisfaction to all Ontarians.

Before this 20-year veteran of the ministry could compete internationally, he took top spot in both the eastern region and the provincial championships. In Minneapolis he went head to head against 52 other inspectors who had earned the right to be there representing Mexico, the United States and Canada's other provinces. The rigorous testing included three one-hour written exams on vehicles, drivers and dangerous goods, a personal interview and inspections of a trailer, motor coach, cargo tank and a driver and rig carrying dangerous goods.

Back home, on a typical day Officer Larocque --

The Speaker (Hon Chris Stockwell): Thank you.

Interruption.

The Speaker: Although the public members in the gallery are out of order, I'll presume there's unanimous consent to allow them to stay. Agreed? Agreed.

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KIDNEY DIALYSIS

Mr John C. Cleary (Cornwall): It has been over a year and a half since the Minister of Health announced that dialysis treatment would be available in Cornwall. Since then, there have only been delays, mixups and confusion.

First, it was revealed that the provider selected was involved in legal proceedings in the United States, launching the ministry into its own court battle. Though the court proceedings are now over, and so supposedly the end of a 30-day waiting period, local patients and their health officials are still uncertain if and when the facilities will be set up.

Residents in my area are asking: "Are there any outstanding legal issues? What are the proposals on the table?" -- and most importantly -- "When exactly will the facility be set up and treating patients?"

The people of the greater Cornwall area, the patients, their families and health care representatives are tired of the minister's standard reply, "as soon as possible," and have requested meetings with the minister or his staff. These answers are needed now. Winter conditions are fast approaching.

ONTARIO HYDRO

Mr Floyd Laughren (Nickel Belt): Most Ontario citizens are aware there are problems at Ontario Hydro. Ontario Hydro itself has said that a recovery plan to make its nuclear division safe and efficient will cost up to $8.8 billion.

This Legislature has created a select committee, under the able chairmanship of Derwyn Shea, to examine Hydro's problems and, more specifically, its recovery plan for its nuclear division. In the middle of this activity there appears in our major daily newspapers this morning full-page ads with a very large picture of a very serious Bill Farlinger, CEO of Ontario Hydro.

So while Ontario Hydro has an $8-billion problem, they still have enough money to run a public relations campaign, for what purpose I can only guess.

As well, Mr Farlinger states in the ad, concerning his recovery plan, "I will be outlining that plan to the government's select committee very soon." Here we have the CEO of Ontario Hydro referring to the government's select committee, not a select committee of the Legislature but a government select committee. And you wonder why we wanted an independent inquiry.

Mr Farlinger has already determined that he will be outlining the recovery plan to the committee. Says who? Who invited him? Not me. I guess things never change. Ontario Hydro still think they run the government.

OPERATION CLEAN SWEEP

Mr Jerry J. Ouellette (Oshawa): I rise to address the House today regarding a recent event that took place in my riding of Oshawa. On Saturday, September 13, over 25 representatives of the Ontario chapter of the Canadian Sanitation Supply Association, or the CSSA, participated in Operation Clean Sweep.

Every year on the same weekend representatives from the chapters in each province or region choose a non-profit location to perform their work. Here in Ontario volunteers came from all over the Golden Horseshoe to assist.

This year Operation Clean Sweep was held at the Oshawa YWCA in downtown Oshawa. The YWCA in Oshawa provides supportive housing and recreational programs for women and children in the region of Durham.

This is the third year Operation Clean Sweep has assisted non-profit organizations by donating supplies, physically cleaning entire buildings and providing free supplies and equipment for use throughout the entire year.

With its 170 members in Ontario and provincial chapters in Quebec, Saskatchewan, Alberta, British Columbia and Atlantic Canada, CSSA provided volunteers and participated in this year's Operation Clean Sweep.

One of the youngest of the volunteers at the Oshawa YWCA event was little three-year-old Taylor, who worked as hard as she could for this year's project in Oshawa.

I would like to thank the Canadian Sanitation Supply Association and its dedicated volunteers for stepping up in our community and making a valuable contribution, as well as all those who participate in events such as these in all our communities every day.

MOTIONS

COMMITTEE SUBSTITUTIONS

Hon David Johnson (Chair of the Management Board of Cabinet, Government House Leader): I move that Mr Cullen be substituted for Mr Miclash on the standing committee on government agencies; and that Mr Caplan be substituted for Mr Brown on the standing committee on regulations and private bills.

The Speaker (Hon Chris Stockwell): Is it the pleasure of the House that the motion carry? Carried.

GOVERNMENT ADVERTISING

Mr James J. Bradley (St Catharines): On a point of privilege, Mr Speaker: Under the provision of the new rules which have been imposed on this Legislature by the government, I gave you notice of the fact that I would be raising an issue. I have to give it an hour ahead of time, at least, so that you have some time to contemplate it, and so the opposition won't raise as many of these motions, I'm told. Anyway, it's in regard to government advertising.

The last time that I rose on this I was dealing with a pamphlet that the government had been involved with involving education. This is the million-dollar campaign where the government is spending a million dollars worth of taxpayers' money to convey what I consider to be a blatantly partisan message. But I'm talking today about the tape of the advertising that everybody sees on television now and that all taxpayers are paying for to the tune of over a million dollars.

The wording of the script of the ad tells me that the Minister of Education, I guess it would be in this case, because it's his ministry that is putting out the ad, would be in contempt of the Ontario Legislature with this advertising campaign because it states that the government is implementing a plan and part of that plan issues regulations dealing with class size. The script clearly reveals that. I took advantage of the opportunity to look at the script of this ad.

Interjection: Oh, oh.

Mr Bradley: The member from Wellington Dufferin-Peel says "Oh, oh," and he's right, because it is rather condemning.

Here's what the actual script of the ad says: "The government is implementing a comprehensive plan to ensure that our children can compete with anybody in the world. It includes more emphasis on the basics, limited class sizes...." If we look at the compendium that comes along with this bill, it makes a point here that it empowers the Lieutenant Governor in Council to issue regulations related to class size.

The ad conveys the distinct impression to people who wouldn't know that the legislation is not necessary, that somehow this is a foregone conclusion, the government is going to implement this and the Legislature doesn't seem to have anything to do with it.

Earlier you made a ruling and I'd like to quote from that ruling because I think it applies in this particular case. You said the following on January 22, 1997, Hansard, page 6442:

"However, I am very concerned by the ministry pamphlet, which was worded more definitely than the commercial and the press release. To name but a few examples, the brochure claims that `new city wards will be created,' that `work on building the new city will start in 1997,' and that `the new city of Toronto will reduce the number of municipal politicians.'" So you are familiar with that ruling.

"How is one to interpret such unqualified claims? In my opinion, they convey the impression that the passage of the requisite legislation was not necessary or was a foregone conclusion, or that the assembly and the Legislature had a pro forma, tangential, even inferior role in the legislative and lawmaking process, and in doing so, they appear to diminish the respect that is due to this House." That was specifically dealing with that pamphlet. "I would not have come to this view had these claims or proposals -- and that is all they are -- been qualified by a statement that they would only become law if and when the Legislature gave its stamp of approval to them."

You went on to say that "the wording and circulation of the pamphlet appear on their face to cross the line. I say in all candour that a reader of that document could be left with an incorrect impression about how parliamentary democracy works in Ontario, an impression that undermines respect for our parliamentary institutions."

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You went on to say, "At this point in my ruling, I want to express some personal concerns about the propriety of public funds being used to advocate, through advertising, a particular position on a matter that is before the House. Let me be clear: I am not speaking here about politically paid for advertising, but rather about funds that are contributed to by every Ontarian, regardless of his or her political view. Personally, I would find it offensive if taxpayer dollars were being used to convey a political or partisan message. There is nothing wrong with members debating an issue and influencing public opinion; in fact, it is part of our parliamentary tradition to do so. But I feel that it's wrong for a government to attempt to influence public opinion through advertising that is paid for with public funds."

What I want to zero in on, because I think it applies to this particular case with this particular item that I had in my hand a minute ago, which was a tape -- and I have the tape in my hand again -- is that the minister is in contempt of the House because he has suggested clearly that no approval of this House is required for him to implement the plan. That is clearly what is stated in this particular piece of advertising, and I contend that the member is in contempt of the House for that reason.

Hon David Johnson (Chair of the Management Board of Cabinet, Government House Leader): Mr Speaker, clearly the government and the Ministry of Education have a broad objective of improving the education system in the province of Ontario. I think if we continually get into this nitpicking of trying to find some connection --

Interjections.

The Speaker (Hon Chris Stockwell): Order.

Mr Frank Miclash (Kenora): I am really sorry I showed up today. I never heard the like of it.

The Speaker: The member for Kenora, come to order, please. Government House leader.

Hon David Johnson: They seem to be a little sensitive today. If the idea is to grind everything to a halt so that anything that has a remote connection to any bill that's in front of the Legislature --

Interjections.

The Speaker: Order.

Hon David Johnson: There may be a number of ways the class size could be dealt with. One of the ways may be through the bill that was introduced, but there may be other different ways of dealing with the class size. There is no reference that I'm aware of to any bill. There's no presupposing any bill is passed, any particular legislation is passed. I fail to see what the contempt is.

I think the allegation is that the member for St Catharines is indicating that the minister has assumed that some particular legislation is passed when the House has not yet dealt with it, but I fail to see that in what he has stated today. What he stated today includes a broad message from the government in terms of improving education. I think it's clear that class size is a concern to those who are involved in the education system, and there may be a number of ways of dealing with the class size.

The Liberal government, when it was in power, advertised to the tune of $13 million, the NDP $13 million. There is a requirement --

Interjections.

The Speaker: Order. If both sides of the House would come to order to get this point of order dealt with, I'd appreciate it. Government House leader.

Hon David Johnson: There is a requirement to communicate to the people of Ontario about a topic as important as education. I'm sure all governments have done this. I'm sure that the previous government did it, that the Liberal government did it. The facts in terms of the advertising communication budget point out that this government does less advertising than any of the previous governments have done over the last 10 years. Nevertheless, there is the requirement to communicate on education, on health care matters, to the people of Ontario. This is just a regular form of that communication, not presupposing any particular legislation is passed, and I would submit certainly not in contempt of this Legislature.

Mr Bud Wildman (Algoma): The government House leader in his intervention has betrayed the very attitude we're concerned about. His attitude seems to be that the processes of the assembly, the introduction and passage of pieces of legislation, is somehow picayune, that by raising concerns we are nitpicking. That's not the case.

The point is, Speaker, that my friend from St Catharines has raised this matter on the basis of a previous ruling by you, as Speaker, with regard to, not the volume of advertising but the content, that is, what does the advertising say? In this particular case, the videotape indicates the government is going to limit class size. The government House leader says there may be other ways of dealing with limiting class size, but --

The Speaker: Order. Can the House come to order. If there are meetings that need to take place, I wish they'd take place outside this chamber -- down at the end, there. Thanks very much. I'm sure it's an important meeting. I'd appreciate it if it could take place in the lobby. It's difficult to hear the member for Algoma.

Mr Wildman: The government House leader indicated there may be other ways of dealing with class size limitation. That indicates the government House leader isn't aware of the current situation. Currently, matters of class size, pupil-teacher ratio, are subject to collective bargaining between school boards and teachers' federations. The government of Ontario does not have any way right now of limiting class size. The Minister of Education and Training introduced a bill yesterday that would give him the power to limit class size, but that bill has only gone through first reading. It has not yet come before the House for debate at second reading or for anything further in the process, a process the government House leader seems to think is somehow picayune. We don't believe it to be.

We understand the previous ruling by you, Speaker, that the House is important, that the role of the legislators is important. The fact is the government can't claim to do something that is pending if legislation is passed because the government then assumes the legislation is going to pass and does not take into account the role of the Legislature, which may in fact not pass the legislation or may change it in some way through amendment. So the advertising in our view is indeed a contempt of the process.

The Speaker: I'll take care to review the video now that I've heard the arguments and report back, more likely tomorrow.

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ORAL QUESTIONS

EDUCATION REFORM

Mr Dalton McGuinty (Leader of the Opposition): My question is for the Minister of Education and Training. I have a question which goes to your integrity and credibility. Last week you assured parents and students alike that the threat of a strike caused by your attempt to remove or tamper with the right to strike was no longer there, that you had addressed it, and specifically you addressed it through your legislation introduced in this House yesterday. Parents of course hoped that this would mean peace throughout the land, that they wouldn't have to worry about your relationship with teachers because you would have fixed everything up.

I took the opportunity to read some of the fine print in your bill and I noticed on pages 50 and 51 that you have given yourself and cabinet the power to "prevent disruption in the education of pupils." What that means very clearly to me, Minister, is that you have retained for yourself the right to interfere with strikes. You told teachers that wasn't on, but apparently it's back on. Why are you trying to sneak your agenda through?

Hon John Snobelen (Minister of Education and Training): I believe that if the Leader of the Opposition were to think back for a moment, he'd always find that in the past in this Legislature parties of all three political stripes have had the ability to order teachers back to work when a strike jeopardized the school year of a student. That power remains in this legislation. It remains under a jeopardy ruling currently held by the ERC. This legislation continues the Education Relations Commission in that function. That will be unchanged by this legislation, because I think all three parties have agreed in the past, and I believe most people in Ontario would agree, that there's not an unfettered right to strike, that that ends with the right of a student to get an education and complete their year of studies. That continues just as it has been.

Mr McGuinty: Let's go over this wording, because I think the exact wording is very important. You say in here that you retain for yourself "in such transitional matters as the Lieutenant Governor in Council considers necessary or advisable in connection with the school system reforms of 1997-98, including, but not limited to, regulations providing for such matters as the Lieutenant Governor in Council considers advisable to prevent disruption in the education of pupils."

The reason that teachers were on their feet and were prepared to go to the streets was because you were threatening to interfere with their right to strike during the transitional phase. You said that was no longer on, that everything was okay, to go back to the classrooms and settle down and that parents need no longer be concerned. I've discovered a provision in this bill of yours which does precisely what you said you weren't going to do. Once again, Minister, why are you trying to sneak in something through the back door?

Hon Mr Snobelen: That's simply not the case. We made an announcement some six months ago now that we would have a fair funding model, that we would make sure that we had funding for this transitional year that would protect all of the existing programs and services and the contracts between teachers and their boards in this school year which takes us through the transition period. We obviously have protected those contractual agreements that are in place now.

I said last week, and I meant what I said, that we would not with this legislation -- and it does not -- interfere with the teachers' right to strike. These are the same kind of rights and privileges teachers have enjoyed under previous legislation; however, it has been improved.

If the Leader of the Opposition will read through the legislation, he'll find that we've answered some of the concerns of teachers with regard to bargaining contracts, so they can be done in a more timely manner. We put teachers into the Labour Relations Act, which will help them have their disputes handled in a way that's much more expeditious than the way it has been under Bill 100. I think the Leader of the Opposition will find that we have not only lived up to our commitment of last week, we've actually improved the climate for teachers in the province.

Mr McGuinty: You've got -- and this makes it perfectly clear -- a serious credibility problem when it comes to improving education in Ontario. You said you weren't going to touch the right to strike. The fact of the matter is that you have done that. You said you weren't going to cut classroom funding; you did that. You cut junior kindergarten, you cut special education, you cut adult education in Ontario.

There have been all kinds of media opportunities for you to address one particular fear and concern. You have said that you are intent on removing another billion dollars from education in Ontario. Here is your chance right now, Minister. I want you to stand up and I want you to tell us that you will not remove any further money from education in Ontario.

Hon Mr Snobelen: In direct response to the matter, if there's a credibility gap here, it's with the Leader of the Opposition.

Interjection.

The Speaker: Member for Kenora, come to order.

Mr Mike Colle (Oakwood): He could have said yes --

The Speaker: Member for Oakwood, come to order.

Hon Mr Snobelen: He brings up a section of the bill that deals with ensuring that students in mixed-language schools don't lose their rights when the boards move to either English- or French-language programs. That's what the intention of that part of the bill is, and he brings it up as if it were some override of strikes. Let me say again very clearly, we have protected that right for teachers in this legislation.

As for the funding model, I can tell the member opposite this. It's our intention to have the funding of our students in the province of Ontario meet their needs for a first-class education. We won't tie it to the broken programs of the past that were tied to the assessment of property. We'll tie it to their needs. That's what we're doing right now so we can guarantee a quality education for every student in the province.

VISITOR

The Speaker (Hon Chris Stockwell): I'd like to introduce, in the government members' gallery, Lorna Fitzsimons, member of Parliament in Britain for Rochdale and chairman of the PLP Women's Group. Welcome.

New question, leader of the official opposition.

Mr Dalton McGuinty (Leader of the Opposition): My next question is for the Minister of Health. I understand that he is on the way.

The Speaker: Okay. Leader of the third party.

EDUCATION FINANCING

Mr Howard Hampton (Rainy River): I have a question for the Minister of Education and Training as well. Yesterday the minister said his government was taking another step in their comprehensive plan for education. But there's a large hole in this comprehensive plan. It doesn't have a budget. He refuses to make the funding formula available.

I want to ask the minister this: We already know that your cuts to our children's education are hurting classrooms, and your own Education Improvement Commission said to you that any money that is found through restructuring should be reinvested in our schools, should be reinvested in our children.

I want to ask the minister, will you commit today to reinvesting in our schools, in our children's education, any money that is found through your legislative changes or through your school board restructuring changes? Will you commit to that?

Hon John Snobelen (Minister of Education and Training): The leader of the third party may want us to tie our funding of education to an old system of funding that everyone who has examined it has found wanting, that has made second-class students of some of our young people in Ontario by virtue of their being underfunded, a model that was tied to the property value of homes and businesses in a community instead of the needs of students in that community. That's what the leader of the third party would like us to tie our funding to.

We think we should have a blank page. We think you should start with the expert panel reports on what our students need, what it'll cost to meet those needs, benchmark those needs and then make sure that every student in Ontario has enough funding for a quality education. That's the approach we're taking. The leader of the third party would like us to stay in the old broken funding system. We think it's time to change that to meet the needs of the students in the province.

Mr Hampton: This is bizarre. The government claims to have a comprehensive plan for education, but they refuse to make the funding formula public. They refuse to tell the people, and most of all the children of Ontario, what the funding formula is. Minister, this is not about property tax values; this is about whether you're prepared to make a commitment to reinvest any money that is found in the educational system, to reinvest that money in our children, in our schools. That's what it is, pure and simple; nothing more, nothing less.

We believe you want to take $1 billion more out of our children's education. That's why I put to the question to you. Will you commit that any money that is found through your legislative changes, through your school board restructuring changes, will be reinvested in our children, will be reinvested in our schools?

Hon Mr Snobelen: Let me make it clear to the leader of the third party what we are doing. It's called "consulting"; it's called "asking the experts in education what it will take to make sure every student in this province has a first-quality education." That's what we're doing. It's a process we have been engaged in for some months now. There are a lot of people working very hard at doing just that. We intend to listen to their advice and we intend to build the right funding formula. In the interim, we're guaranteeing the quality of education for our students. We're guaranteeing that during the transition there'll be no withdrawal of funding. We've already made that promise.

But let me be clear to the leader of the third party: We do intend to cut. We intend to cut administration duplication; we intend to cut politicians; we intend to cut waste and duplication. We intend to increase teaching time; we intend to increase our students' performance. That's the whole purpose of our reforms.

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The Speaker (Hon Chris Stockwell): Final supplementary.

Mr Bud Wildman (Algoma): The minister, despite his rhetoric, is not prepared to tell us in dollars what he is going to invest in education. He won't tell us what his budget is. He doesn't have a fiscal plan apparently.

Parents don't want you to take more money out of education than you have already taken. You have already taken too much. Kids are doing without classroom supplies, textbooks. They're having to pay fees to provide the basic supplies for certain courses.

Is the minister prepared to make a basic commitment, without any rhetoric, that whatever moneys are found, if any moneys are saved through the various things he said he intended to do, all the dollars will be reinvested in the classrooms for the students of Ontario?

Hon Mr Snobelen: I want to tell the member for Algoma that I had a chance as late as last night to listen to the concerns of parents. I went to a parents' meeting to listen to what they had to say last night. I think they had the same --

Interjections.

Hon Mr Snobelen: Thank you.

Mr Gilles Pouliot (Lake Nipigon): You stole the money, Minister.

Interjections.

The Speaker: Well, you know, I've heard a few people tell me you can't say that, but it has been said in the past by your Premier, accusing Mr Laughren from Nickel Belt of stealing the northern development moneys.

Interjections.

The Speaker: Member for Nickel Belt, I was not suggesting that; I was just pointing out that there were accusations made in the past.

Mr Floyd Laughren (Nickel Belt): Thank you, Mr Speaker, and I appreciate that half-hearted apology, but I really must insist that you withdraw that.

The Speaker: Let me qualify the withdrawal.

Interjections.

The Speaker: I certainly withdraw.

Hon Mr Snobelen: To the member for Algoma: Parents are concerned that we meet the needs of their students. That's their primary concern. They are very pleased we have curriculum now in place that sets out standards year by year. They are very pleased we have a common report card across the province. They are very pleased we have measures for their student performance so they can find out what is going on.

I made those parents last night the same promise I have made parents across this province, the one I intend to be held to account for, and that is at the end of the day, our funding won't be tied to property value, it will be tied to their students' needs, and we'll have enough funding in this allocation model to meet the needs of their students, not tied to the past but tied to their needs in the future, a system designed for their future and for the future of the province. That's our commitment.

PAY EQUITY

Mr Howard Hampton (Rainy River): My question is for the minister responsible for women's issues, and I noted she was here. Is she returning?

The Speaker (Hon Chris Stockwell): She is scheduled to be here. Go ahead.

Mr Hampton: Minister, two weeks ago the Ontario Court of Justice ruled that your government's attempt to take away $400 million in pay equity payments from the lowest-paid women in Ontario violated the Charter of Rights and the Constitution of Canada. Last week the Premier said something very alarming about this, and I think I can quote him here. He said that the government was moving ahead with implementation of the court order but that Ontario will not be providing funding to the broader public sector employers involved. In other words, he said the associations for community living and nursing homes and so on that are out there should make the pay equity payments, but the government isn't going to pay them.

I want to read a section of the judge's ruling for you. He said: "To continue the proxy method of paying pay equity without government funding would send large numbers of the employers of these women into bankruptcy. These employers depend on government funding." Will you commit today that the government is going --

The Speaker: Thank you. Minister.

Hon Dianne Cunningham (Minister of Intergovernmental Affairs, minister responsible for women's issues): In response to the leader of the third party, I think he knows this is an extremely serious issue and that we have taken time to consider our alternatives, because all the alternatives are extremely serious with regard to the fact that we have a challenge with the Minister of Labour and the Attorney General and the Premier. We will seriously consider a fair solution.

Mr Hampton: This is about the so-called fair solution that the Premier was talking about in the press. I want to quote the judge again. This is what the judge said:

"To continue the proxy method of paying pay equity without government funding would send large numbers of the employers of these women into bankruptcy. These employers depend on government funding for their very existence. Any increase in pay for these employees must be paid for by the government."

Your Premier is out there saying these community organizations who look after the poor, who look after the vulnerable, who look after people who are developmentally delayed, these people who do good work, who look after the elderly, should just pay the bill, and he refuses to commit that your government will pay. The judge said in his judgement, if that's the route your government follows, literally thousands of these women will lose their jobs and our communities will lose valuable services.

I put it to you, are you going to pay or are you going to force some of these valuable community employers into bankruptcy and force these women --

The Speaker: Thank you. Minister.

Hon Mrs Cunningham: In response to the question once again, I think it would be very unfair to send the message out that anybody is going to force our community agencies into bankruptcy. That is an extremely irresponsible statement, number one.

Number two, I would like to respond in this way. I've already stated that the Attorney General, the Minister of Labour, myself for women's issues, the Premier and others are seriously considering a fair solution.

The Speaker: Final supplementary.

Ms Marilyn Churley (Riverdale): Minister, I can tell you right now you should read the press clipping. It was your Premier who put that message out there, not a member of the opposition. We're responding to what your very own Premier said. He's scaring people out there. He wouldn't commit to the government funding this.

Let's go back to the judge's ruling and let's be very clear. It says, "It should be emphasized that without government funding, pay equity in the broader public sector could not be achieved or maintained." That's pretty clear. He says that to implement his decision without full government funding for pay equity, "would send large numbers of the employers of these women into bankruptcy."

Minister, let me remind you again we're talking about some of the poorest-paid women in Ontario. We're talking about child care centres, nursing homes, women's shelters and many other community organizations. I want to give you an opportunity again. Stand up and say that at the very least you will fight in your own cabinet to make sure the government stands up for these women and puts the money in towards pay equity.

Hon Mrs Cunningham: The government has to make a decision in this regard. We want to make a fair decision. I think the member knows that we are looking for that decision and I think I've answered the question today. I'm not going to answer on behalf of all of my colleagues in the House at this moment, but you will get a response.

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SPEECH PATHOLOGY

Mrs Sandra Pupatello (Windsor-Sandwich): My question is for the Minister of Education. Last year almost 20 speech pathologists were eliminated from Ontario schools and school boards. Today parents of children with autism are here in the gallery. You'll see them here in yellow T-shirts. They're cycling across Ontario to raise awareness for their children with autism.

Their children are some of the children we know are falling through the cracks with your cuts to schools. This week, speech pathologists are releasing a report that shows that this year there will be even fewer speech pathologists. These parents are at their wits' end and some, like last week, take their children to Thistletown and say, "We need your help."

Minister, autism is a communications disorder and communication is critical to learning. What will you say to these parents in the gallery today?

Hon John Snobelen (Minister of Education and Training): I'll refer this to the minister responsible for community and social services.

Mr Joseph Cordiano (Lawrence): Don't you know about special ed in school? That is pretty disgraceful.

The Speaker (Hon Chris Stockwell): Member for Lawrence, come to order, please.

Mr Cordiano: That is pretty disgraceful.

Mr Rick Bartolucci (Sudbury): These kids don't belong in a classroom. That's what he's saying.

The Speaker: Member for Lawrence, member for Sudbury, come to order, please.

Hon Janet Ecker (Minister of Community and Social Services): I had the privilege of helping the local chapter of the Autism Society kick off its fund-raising campaign this weekend. I would like to congratulate them on the work they are doing to raise the profile of this particular disability that some children suffer with.

It's one of the reasons this government was very pleased to announce earlier this year that we will be doubling the number of children who will benefit from speech and language support in the education system. We know and recognize that this is a very important support for those children, especially in those early ages. I'm also pleased to know that the Minister of Education has recognized the need to ensure, in future funding of schools, that special education is included.

Mrs Pupatello: These are more examples of announcements where money does not actually flow into the programs to help these children. You, Minister, who went to help them at a fund-raising campaign, are missing the point. You're the very government that is taking these services away.

In the gallery today we have Claudio Del Duca, a father of two sons with autism. One of his children, Gabriel, is losing his speech pathology in his school this year. It started this September, your Minister of Education cutting speech pathologists from school boards, your ministry announcing money that never flows to actually help the children.

What we need to tell you is that we're talking about real people. We're talking about Gabriel. We believe Gabriel has every right to reach his full potential. Your own government is making these cuts that affect these children. Minister, please, when you respond, talk to Claudio Del Duca. What can you tell him now that your government has taken his speech therapy away?

Hon Mrs Ecker: The first thing I would tell this individual in the gallery is that he might wish to be careful who he listens to in terms what is actually happening out there. This government has not reduced those services.

Interjections.

Hon Mrs Ecker: I would like to reiterate that we have not slashed special education funding; we have not slashed those services. In effect, we are increasing the spending for speech and language. We are putting that money in the community based on the recommendations of district health councils and other community-based groups. I'm sure the honourable member would like us to continue to consult and listen to them. We know that resource must be directed, as much as we can, for intervention and prevention.

One of the reasons this government is taking the authority in school and education that we are is because when school boards sat there and had a choice of what they were going to hit, isn't it interesting that one of the most sensitive services, one of the services that those children need so much --

Interjections.

The Speaker: Member for Windsor-Sandwich, member for Hamilton East and member for Oriole, come to order.

Mrs Pupatello: The minister doesn't have it as a mandated service.

The Speaker: Member for Windsor-Sandwich, I'm not going to warn you again. Come to order.

Hon Mrs Ecker: We know that service is very important for those children. We have encouraged those school boards to continue to fund that. We are allocating, as I understand it, that special education is something that needs to be included in funding for education and we are continuing to support that service.

The Speaker: The leader's question, the leader of the official opposition.

HOSPITAL RESTRUCTURING

Mr Dalton McGuinty (Leader of the Opposition): I have a question for the Minister of Health. Minister, if there's one thing that people are saying about this government, of course, it is that you're moving too far, too fast. This applies particularly when we're talking about hospital closures in Ontario.

You've closed three in Ottawa -- the Riverside, the Grace and the Montfort -- and you have decided that those are going to close in 1998. Every year 23,000 surgical operations are performed in those three hospitals. Those 23,000 operations are going to have to be performed at the Ottawa General Hospital. The problem is, we're closing those three in 1998 and the Ottawa General Hospital won't have the new facilities built to accommodate those 23,000 patients until the year 2000.

My question of you, Minister, is quite simply: Where should these 23,000 patients go? To those operating rooms which will have been locked or to those which have yet to be built?

Hon Jim Wilson (Minister of Health): It should be obvious to the honourable member and everyone else that if the construction isn't completed within the time lines as directed by the commission, then the patients obviously will stay where they are.

There's one rule in all this: Overall services are being enhanced, not cut, in the Ottawa restructuring report, as in all the restructuring reports. Common sense dictates that the honourable member should be able to answer his own question, and that is that if the physical space isn't available, then nobody will move anywhere. The commission has set time lines because they want people to aim for those targets, but they are experts, including friends of many of the health care providers in Ottawa, and they realize and will know, as we move forward, what's feasible and what isn't feasible.

The fact of the matter is, to say that people will go into limbo might be the way the Liberals were planning to run the health care system on a $17-billion budget, versus our $18 billion, but that's not the way we're planning it.

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Mr McGuinty: This comes as news to the Riverside, the Grace and the Montfort because they've been issued very clear orders. As of June 30, 1998, they are to be shut down, no ifs, ands or buts. They are over, there is no more business and all their patients are to go elsewhere.

You should have seen this coming, Minister. The Ottawa General Hospital in its very own report submitted to your commission said, and I quote: "Even more critical than the capital investment required is the timetable for all this work. We submit that critical care areas such as an expanded emergency department, surgical suite and intensive care unit could not be made available prior to the end of the year 2000."

They told you up front. Why are you putting patient care at risk? You have said very clearly that three hospitals have to be shut down in 1998. The new accommodation will not be available until the year 2000. Once again, where do these 23,000 surgical patients go? Should they go to those operating rooms which have been locked up or go to those which have yet to be built?

Hon Mr Wilson: The honourable member is taking a very strange position on restructuring when it is of net benefit to his community. I guess he wants to deny the people of Ottawa the new technologies, the nursing home beds, the long-term-care services. Where exactly are you on restructuring, Mr McGuinty, today? Are you in favour or are you against it? That's what I want to know.

Mr McGuinty: If the minister wants to know whose side we are on, he should understand very clearly that we are on the side of patients. We are on the side of quality health care in Ontario.

Tragically, this is all part of a pattern that has been emerging for some time as a result of this minister's breakneck --

Interjections.

The Speaker (Hon Chris Stockwell): Member for Kitchener, can you come to order, please? And Ottawa-Rideau, can you come to order as well? I can see you there, yes. No matter how far you slouch down, I can still see you. I appreciate everybody is seeking help all the time. Thank you.

Interjections.

The Speaker: Let's come to order, please. Leader of the official opposition.

Mr McGuinty: Minister, you're going too far, too fast. Everybody outside of this place recognizes that and understands that and you're putting patient care at risk. It's as simple as that. We've heard stories like this in London, Toronto, Windsor and now in Ottawa. By moving too quickly, you're putting patient care at risk. We're not talking about a corporate reorganization here or shutting down a plant in order to retool. You're talking about patients who are going to need surgery; 23,000 will be without surgical units for two years in Ottawa. What are you going to do about it?

Hon Mr Wilson: That is simply ridiculous. The honourable member is making up something hypothetical that I'm sure doesn't come from his community. His community is very much working on restructuring. We're still waiting. We're on the time lines.

I don't know where the question comes from that he made up. First he says we're going too slow and we won't have the operating rooms, the six more operating rooms that Ottawa will get in addition to what they have today. He says we're moving too slow. Now in the final supplementary he says we're moving too fast. He totally makes up the question. It doesn't come from any facts. I'm doing my very best to answer a ridiculous question.

I remind the honourable member that we're still waiting. In all of these restructurings with Metro, London and Ottawa, everyone has till October 9 to answer the 45-day response period the commission put out for community reinvestment, so we don't know what the final tab is yet.

FAMILY RESPONSIBILITY OFFICE

Ms Shelley Martel (Sudbury East): I have a question for the Attorney General regarding his continued mismanagement of the family support plan. On May 9, fully five months after this Legislature passed Bill 82, you finally proclaimed part of the bill. You announced that you would begin testing the suspension of driver's licences and that this enforcement tool would be fully in place by September 1997. You said, "The testing of the suspension of driver's licences will begin immediately to ensure a smooth and full implementation in September of 1997."

We have learned that your driver's licence suspension project is not up and running, and when you finally begin testing, you are only going to test 100 drivers who are in arrears. Minister, you broke your promise to women and children. Once again, why can't you do anything right with respect to the family support plan?

Hon Charles Harnick (Attorney General, minister responsible for native affairs): I'm very pleased to hear by the tone of the member's question that she is now in favour of driver's licence suspension. I note that when it was proposed to her government some five or six years ago, it was rejected out of hand, otherwise it would be up and running today and maybe we wouldn't have a billion dollars' worth of arrears in the family support plan.

Mr Howard Hampton (Rainy River): Totally false.

Hon Mr Harnick: The leader of the third party says, "Totally false." I'd invite the leader of the third party --

Interjections.

Hon Mr Harnick: Mr Speaker, I note that the leader of the third party says that's not true. I invite the leader of the third party to speak to Mothers Against Fathers in Arrears and Families Against Deadbeats and find out from them that they were turned away when they made that suggestion, that it was dismissed out of hand. As a result of that, they ran a family support plan that had no ability to collect money. They didn't even have a plan that considered self-employed people as part of it. They couldn't even get the definition of who had to make payment in the plan correct. Their plan was --

The Speaker (Hon Chris Stockwell): Supplementary.

Mr Peter Kormos (Welland-Thorold): Back in December the parliamentary assistant, speaking on behalf of the Attorney General, promised the people of this province that implementation of the key enforcement tools will begin by the end of January. This Attorney General soon afterwards promised that the suspension of driver's licences will become effective in September 1997.

The only thing the people of this province can rely on from you is your continued incompetence. The fact is, not a penny has been collected in over nine months as a result of the passage in this House of Bill 82 -- not a single penny of moneys in arrears. Just what is it about your incompetence that has prevented you from getting a single enforcement tool, any one of the 10, operative in the course of almost 10 months?

Hon Mr Harnick: I can tell this House that we will be years ahead of that party in terms of implementing real enforcement techniques to the family support plan.

Interjections.

Mr Kormos: If you tell the truth, people won't have to say that, Charlie.

The Speaker: I warn the members for Sudbury East and Welland-Thorold to come to order. I'm not warning you again. The member for Cochrane North.

Hon Mr Harnick: They left a legacy of a billion dollars owing to women and children.

Quite simply, we are developing a plan that will have real enforcement techniques. I appreciate they'd like us to be able to go faster. If they really wanted to go faster, these are the kinds of things they had an opportunity to implement when they were the government. Unfortunately, they rejected it out of hand. They were happy to rack up deficits of $100 million --

Interjections.

The Speaker: Member for Fort York, would you come to order. I ask the third party members to come to order, please. I can't hear the minister's answer. I've warned the member for Sudbury. I've warned the member for Welland-Thorold. Member for Fort York, come to order.

Hon Mr Harnick: As I was saying, they did not want to implement any enforcement measures that would successfully collect arrears owing to women and children. They were quite content to run a plan that had $100 million of debt going into it every year. They were familiar with --

Interjections.

The Speaker: Members, I'm trying my best to maintain control.

Interjection: It's not very good.

The Speaker: Who said that?

Interjections.

The Speaker: Minister.

Hon Mr Harnick: As I was saying, this was a party that, when they were in government, rejected these things out of hand and were quite content and comfortable to rack up $100 million a year in debt owing to women and children. They were quite pleased to do that and to reject suggestions to really collect money out of hand.

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MUNICIPAL ENUMERATION

Mr John L. Parker (York East): My question is for the Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing.

Interjections.

Mr Parker: I know the opposition is going to be very interested in hearing this question and the answer to it, so I invite them to pay close attention.

Minister, with the municipal election approaching soon --

Interjections.

The Speaker (Hon Chris Stockwell): Order. Would the opposition please come to order. Thank you.

Mr Parker: There are many subjects I would like to address, but on this particular occasion, I want to discuss an item that was in the paper yesterday. It suggested that enumeration by the mail-in-ballot system was low. That's a concern to me, with the election coming up soon, and I know it's a concern to my friends opposite. Minister, could you explain to the House just what the method is for the mail-in enumeration and what steps this government has taken to improve that system?

Hon Al Leach (Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing): I'd like to thank the member for York East for his very, very good question. As this House is aware, before every election a mail-in enumeration is done by the Ministry of Finance to update and create a new voters' list. These forms were mailed to 5.2 million households in Ontario between April 28 and May 9 and a very extensive advertising campaign was done at that time to encourage the people in all the municipalities to return their forms and register as soon as possible. The information is then checked by all the municipal clerks. It's provided by July 31 for the clerks to check for errors.

On September 2, the voters' list was made public so people could check to see if their names were on the list. The accuracy of the list is always a concern in an election year and we're encouraging every individual to make sure their name is on that list.

Mr Parker: I've received a few calls from people who are concerned they may not get their material in the mail in time and they might miss the deadline for getting their enumeration on the record. What process is in place to ensure that these people can in fact become enumerated and exercise their democratic right on election day?

Hon Mr Leach: Again I thank the member for his very good question. Any citizen can check to see if their name is on the list by calling, phoning or going to the office of the clerk of their municipality. If they're not on the list and they are there, they can have their name put on the list immediately they're there. They have to take with them a couple of pieces of identification showing their address, where they live, and also a piece of photo ID so the clerks can have that information and make sure they are on the list. Even if they don't do that, and we encourage them to do that, any citizen who shows up to vote and their name does not appear on the list can have their name put on that list right up to 8 o'clock on election day by showing, at the polling booth, proper identification. That's a photo ID and something that shows their address.

PUBLIC SERVICE AND LABOUR RELATIONS REFORM

Mr Richard Patten (Ottawa Centre): My question is to the Minister of Labour. Last Thursday in your statement to the House you told this House you were backing down on major components of your legislation, Bill 136. Although you haven't released the actual amendments you'll be making, you have suggested what amounts to a major rewrite of the bill; in effect, you've gutted the bill. In my opinion the bill will be out of order, because if you are true to your word the heart of the bill has been changed. It will not be the same bill at all and it won't be the same bill this House passed at second reading.

Minister, the right thing to do would be to withdraw Bill 136 and bring forward some new legislation for everyone to see. Will you do so?

Hon Elizabeth Witmer (Minister of Labour): I would tell you that the bill with the changes will still enable the government to meet its objective, and that objective is to ensure a very smooth restructuring as we go through the changes that are being anticipated for the municipalities and the school boards and the hospitals. We will at the end of the day still be able to provide better service at less cost to the taxpayers. The legislation, Bill 136, will still enable us to move forward because certainly the changes we have made will still retain the essential elements of Bill 136.

Mr Patten: Minister, you are reported in the Toronto Sun, "The hearings will provide people with the opportunity to respond to the amendments we have proposed." Those are your words, that people will have a chance to respond to the amendments. How can they do that if you won't release the amendments before the end of the hearings? No one will know for sure what the wording of your amendments will be.

Based on your statement last week, the two commissions which form the backbone of the bill are gone. The restrictive measures of the right to strike are gone. Fair and impartial arbitration is gone. What's left?

Minister, what are you afraid of? Why won't you table those amendments? You know that if you don't table those amendments before, it makes a mockery of the hearings. What are they going to respond to? They'll have nothing to respond to other than the verbal commitments you've made, with no specifics in terms of legislation. Why won't you table those amendments?

Hon Mrs Witmer: Last week I very carefully indicated the major changes the government was making that would still enable us to reach our objectives. We responded to all the concerns that had been put on the table, not only by the OFL but by some of our other stakeholders. We made it abundantly clear that there was no restriction on the right to strike. We also indicated that the Labour Relations Transition Commission would no longer exist and that its responsibilities, the provisions that commission had, were going to be transferred to the Ontario Labour Relations Board. We also indicated that the provisions of the Dispute Resolution Commission were going to revert back to the private sector interest arbitration.

I'm not sure what it is the member doesn't understand. However, it had been clearly enunciated last week and we are continuing to provide information.

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CHARITABLE GAMING

Ms Frances Lankin (Beaches-Woodbine): My question is to the Minister of Municipal Affairs. Last night, North Bay city council passed a bylaw, and that bylaw said no to charity casinos and video lottery terminals for the next year until an impact study is done, a study they say your government should have done before you started forcing these casinos on communities. This is the Premier's home town that has said no to your casinos and your video lottery terminals. We can put that together with communities like Belleville and Barrie and Brantford and many others which have said no.

Your colleague is telling the operators that within 45 days of the announcement of the short list they've got to have their sites in place and it has to be up and operating next year. Community after community is saying no. Shouldn't you back off, ask communities who wants to host these, match proponents with communities, do the proper impact study? Minister, would you approach this in a rational way and stop jamming these things down the throats of unwilling communities?

Hon Al Leach (Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing): I thank the member for her question. It's probably more appropriate to go to my colleague; however, in his absence I will advise the member that we have a list of willing-host communities. All of the charity gaming casinos are going to go to willing-host communities, which only makes sense; those that want them will get them.

As the minister has stated before, the province doesn't intend to force a charity gambling parlour on anyone. If a municipality chooses not to have them, they don't have to have them. If they have them now, the roving, uncontrolled casinos that are creating quite a problem with control, they must be cognizant that they are going out of operation on March 31. So if charities in their communities get money from the roving ones now, they might want to consider very carefully saying no to a permanent one that would have full controls.

Ms Lankin: I heard that threat, and I hope everyone in this province heard that threat. This minister just said that if those communities don't go ahead with these casinos, their charities are not going to get any money. I'm glad it's on the record, because we said that's the threat you're holding over communities.

Minister, community after community after community is saying no to your charitable gaming casinos and video lottery terminals. Why don't you back off this plan you're rushing ahead? You've got proponents lined up whom you've told they have 45 days to get the site, that the site has to be in one of the designated communities. The designated communities are saying no. It's a shambles. You've rushed ahead. You don't understand the consequences of the way you've approached this. Minister, please, rethink this, ask what communities want it, match them up with the proponents, take a rational approach.

Hon Mr Leach: I thank the member for the question. She just repeated everything I said. I said we have a list of willing municipalities that want to have the permanent charity casinos, that have asked for them, and they're the communities that are going to have them. It will be the local council in those communities that votes to say, "Yes, we want a controlled casino." Any community, any municipality, as the minister has publicly stated, that states they do not want one will not have to have one.

In my earlier remarks I was trying to ensure that the communities recognize that the existing roaming casinos, which are totally uncontrolled, will be going out of business as of March 31 next year. I think they should all be aware of that.

SOCIAL ASSISTANCE

Mrs Julia Munro (Durham-York): My question is for the Minister of Community and Social Services. Minister, you recently announced that 218,908 people have stopped depending on welfare since this government was elected in 1995 and over 9,000 people left Ontario's welfare system in August alone. Would the minister indicate how York region's and Durham region's welfare figures compare to the rest of the province?

Hon Janet Ecker (Minister of Community and Social Services): I'm very pleased that both York and Durham have followed the provincial trend. As you know, we've had a 16% reduction in the number of people trapped on welfare across the province. What we've seen in York is that there's been a reduction of some 25%. That's 3,473 cases of individuals who no longer have to rely on welfare. In Durham region, it's a 21% reduction. That's 4,700 cases who no longer have to rely on welfare.

The honourable member for Windsor-Riverside was objecting to this question yesterday. I looked up the figures for Windsor and I am pleased to tell her that there is a 26%, almost 27% reduction in the general welfare caseloads in the community of Windsor. We are seeing very good reductions across the province and we know those individuals are getting off welfare and into jobs, the majority of them. That's where they want to be and that is certainly what we are doing to ensure that it happens.

Mrs Munro: Considering that both regions have experienced such a dramatic drop in the welfare rolls, can the minister tell us how taxpayers in my riding of Durham-York will benefit and how local businesses can get involved to ensure welfare numbers continue to decline?

Hon Mrs Ecker: While we've seen savings across the province, I am pleased to report that in the community of York they have seen a saving of $4 million in the last two years and in Durham it has been a saving of $10 million. Those municipalities are putting those savings to good use, ensuring that services are there.

We also know that many private sector organizations have been willing to support and want to get involved in our work-for-welfare program. Of course one of the rules is that we do not displace paid jobs; that would be defeating the purpose of this. But they can, and many are, supporting programs that community agencies are doing. My parliamentary assistant, my colleague the member for York-Mackenzie, has been out in the communities meeting not only with the business community to explain to them how they can support it, but also with the community agencies, and we're very pleased with the response.

LAKEVIEW NURSING HOME

Mr Sean G. Conway (Renfrew North): My question is to the Minister of Health. Last Thursday afternoon you told the House that we had an obligation in government to pay particular attention to the care of mental health patients in Ontario. With that appropriate observation in mind, I want to ask you a question about the future of the Lakeview Nursing Home in the village of Cobden in the county of Renfrew.

This home was built nearly 30 years ago to provide for a number of adult psychiatric patients who were or had been discharged from Kingston and Brockville. Ten weeks ago you were specifically requested by the current owner of the Lakeview Nursing Home in Cobden to accede to a transfer of that licence from Cobden, Renfrew county, to the Oakville-Burlington area of Halton region.

Minister, can you tell the residents of Lakeview and their families that you will deny that request for the transfer of the nursing home licence from Cobden to Oakville-Burlington?

Hon Jim Wilson (Minister of Health): I thank the honourable member for Renfrew North for bringing this issue to my attention on several occasions, both personally and in the Legislature and through correspondence. He has also, because he is a very good member of the Legislature -- there's a good reason why he's been here for so many years -- met with ministry staff.

I think he knows or should know very well that it's not the intention of the ministry to see that home closed. Through the good work of the local reeve, Dave Stewart, I think we perhaps have some interested new owners of the home or purchasers who will take over the licences from the current owner. I can assure the honourable member that if arrangements can be made at the local level to keep those licences in Cobden, the ministry will give its concurrence.

Mr Conway: The families and the residents of that home will very much appreciate what the minister has had to say. One of the problems we've had in Renfrew county is a dearth of mental health services. Lakeview is really the only facility we've got in the county that provides for the special needs of these very special needs people, who came to us from Kingston and Brockville.

Minister, can you indicate when you expect to make a decision on the Lakeview matter?

Hon Mr Wilson: We will make the decision, I can assure the honourable member, as quickly as possible after we've seen a proposal. Our hope, his hope I think, and certainly that of the community, is that someone will come forward and purchase those licences, take over the operation of the home. We'll see a new operator. The honourable member is right that many of those residents have special needs. I think seven of the residents have actually lived in the home for about 15 years.

They are long-term residents who do have special needs, and my understanding from the honourable member is that the needs are being met very well in those homes. If all goes well, we hope that someone will buy the home and that the residents won't see any change. I don't think they deserve to be upset after so many years of calling the Lakeview Nursing Home their home.

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SPEECH PATHOLOGY

Mr Gilles Bisson (Cochrane South): My question is to the Minister of Community and Social Services. I listened intently a little bit earlier to your response to a question that you got with regard to speech pathology programs, and you stated in this House that your government was not cutting one dime, not one sou, from speech pathology programs in Ontario. Minister, you're wrong. In our community of northeastern Ontario, in Timmins and across the north, we're losing the entire budget for the dollars utilized to pay for speech pathology programs for healthy kids under the age of six.

Your doing that means that none of the kids in northern Ontario under the age of six is going to have access to any government-funded speech pathology program, and what's worse is that the moneys that you announce for new additions to speech pathology are predicated on our having existing programs. If we lose our program, we're not able to build up on top of it.

Will you please talk to the Minister of Health and fix this problem so we don't lose speech pathology programs for people in northern Ontario?

Hon Janet Ecker (Minister of Community and Social Services): I'd be quite pleased to convey to the Minister of Health whatever message the honourable member would like.

One of the things we have certainly acknowledged is that speech and language support is extremely important, especially for those children aged zero to six. That's one of the reasons we have increased funding for it. We announced that in the budget. That's one of the reasons that money is flowing through a community-based planning process to those communities. It's my understanding in the joint cooperation on this between health and community and social services that we're actually going to be able to double the number of children who will receive the service. I'd be quite pleased to look into this for the honourable member.

PETITIONS

VIDEO LOTTERY TERMINALS

Mr James J. Bradley (St Catharines): The issue is arising again. I have a petition to the government of Ontario which reads as follows:

"Since video lottery terminals will contribute to gambling addiction in Ontario and the resulting breakup of families, spousal and child abuse and crimes such as embezzlement and robbery;

"Since the introduction of video lottery terminals across Ontario will provide those addicted to gambling with widespread temptation and will attract young people to a vice which will adversely affect their lives for many years to come;

"Since the introduction of these gambling machines across our province is designed to gain revenue for the government at the expense of the poor, the vulnerable and the desperate in order that the government can cut income taxes to the greatest benefit of those with the highest income;

"Since the placement of video lottery terminals in bars in Ontario and in permanent casinos in various locations across the province represents an escalation of gambling opportunities;

"Since Premier Harris and Finance Minister Eves were so critical of the provincial government becoming involved in further gambling ventures and making the government more dependent on gambling revenues to maintain government operations,

"We, the undersigned, call upon Premier Harris and the government of Ontario to reconsider its announced decision to introduce the most insidious form of gambling, video lottery terminals, to restaurants and bars in the province."

I affix my signature, as I am in complete agreement with the sentiments contained in this petition.

MUNICIPAL RESTRUCTURING

Mr Gilles Bisson (Cochrane South): I feel the number of petitions coming from northern Ontario with regard to speech pathology programs as the response I just got from the minister. None the less, we have other petitions, and these are from a number of people in northern Ontario. I have some couple of hundred signatures here, and it reads as follows:

"Whereas the government of Ontario is proposing to restructure completely the provincial-municipal relationship without having consulted the people of Ontario; and

"This restructuring proposes to download to municipalities the cost of transportation and such critical social services as welfare, long-term care and language-speech pathology for under-six-year-olds;

"Removes school boards' ability to tax, eliminating any effective local control of schools and school programs;

"The government's actions fail to guarantee existing levels of funding and failure to recognize the unequal ability of local communities to bear the cost of these new burdens, thus producing inequalities of access to the people of northern Ontario;

"Whereas the government's lack of meaningful public consultation and disregard for public response pose a serious threat to democracy;

"We, the undersigned residents of Ontario, because we care about the quality of life in our province and the wellbeing of our children, neighbours and communities, register a vote of non-confidence to the government in the province of Ontario."

I affix my signature to that petition.

COURT DECISION

Mr Bob Wood (London South): I have a petition signed by 24 people. It reads as follows:

"Whereas the courts have ruled that women have the lawful right to go topless in public; and

"Whereas the Liberal government of Canada has the power to change the Criminal Code to reinstate such public nudity as an offence;

"We, the undersigned, respectfully petition the government of Ontario to pass a bill empowering municipalities to enact bylaws governing dress code and to continue to urge the government of Canada to pass legislation to reinstate such partial nudity as an offence."

TUITION FEES

Mr Dwight Duncan (Windsor-Walkerville): I have a petition to present to the Legislative Assembly of Ontario.

"Whereas the Conservative government has cut funding to St Clair College; and

"Whereas these funding cuts have caused hardship on senior citizens by increasing the costs for their programs by more than 400%;

"We, the undersigned, petition the Legislative Assembly of Ontario as follows:

"To ensure that all college programs, be they education or recreation, remain affordable and accessible to senior citizens."

I join with the hundreds of constituents of mine who have signed this petition and affix my signature to this petition.

AMBULANCE SERVICE

Mr Howard Hampton (Rainy River): I have a petition to the Legislative Assembly of Ontario. It says:

"We, the undersigned, petition the Legislative Assembly of Ontario as follows:

"That the Fort Frances ambulance dispatch not be moved to Kenora."

This has been signed by close to 100 residents of Fort Frances and the area. I affix my signature to it as well.

COURT DECISION

Mr Bert Johnson (Perth): I have a petition signed by about 71 of my constituents. It reads:

"To the Legislative Assembly of Ontario:

"Whereas communities strongly disagree with allowing women to go topless in public;

"We, the undersigned, petition the Legislative Assembly of Ontario as follows:

"To enact legislation to require women to wear tops in public places for the protection of our children and for public safety in general."

I'll sign it so that it becomes a permanent record of this House.

TFO

M. Jean-Marc Lalonde (Prescott et Russell) : J'ai une pétition adressée à l'Assemblée législative de l'Ontario :

«Attendu que TFO appartient aux Ontariens et Ontariennes ;

«Attendu que le gouvernement de Mike Harris a fait fi des sentiments de la population qui veut le maintien de la propriété et du financement public de TFO en tant que diffuseur éducationnel en soumettant TFO à un examen concernant sa privatisation ;

«Attendu que le gouvernement de Mike Harris n'a pas indiqué que la population participerait à part entière à l'examen concernant la privatisation ;

«Nous, soussignataires de cette pétition présentée à l'Assemblée législative de l'Ontario, demandons la tenue d'une consultation publique ouverte et honnête auprès des Ontariens et Ontariennes avant qu'une décision sur l'avenir de TFO soit prise.»

FIRE IN HAMILTON

Mr David Christopherson (Hamilton Centre): I have a petition from my home town of Hamilton to the honourable Minister of Environment and Energy and the Premier of Ontario. It reads as follows:

"Whereas a fire at a PVC plastic vinyl plant located in the middle of one of Hamilton's residential areas burned for three days; and

"Whereas the city of Hamilton declared a state of emergency and called for a limited voluntary evacuation of several blocks around the site; and

"Whereas the burning of PVC results in the formation and release of toxic substances such as dioxins, as well as large quantities of heavy metals and other dangerous chemicals;

"Therefore we, the undersigned, petition the Legislative Assembly of Ontario to hold a full public inquiry on the Hamilton Plastimet fire."

I proudly add my name to those of these citizens.

ROCK MUSIC GROUP

Mr John R. Baird (Nepean): I'm pleased to present two petitions, one from Marie McClurg and the other from Gail Laflamme. They read as follows:

"To the Legislative Assembly of Ontario:

"Whereas the rock band Marilyn Manson was permitted to play a concert at the Ottawa Congress Centre on Friday, August 1, 1997; and

"Whereas Marilyn Manson's wilful promotion of hatred, violence, immorality and obscenity has been linked to teen suicides and adolescent crimes across North America; and

"Whereas by allowing Marilyn Manson to perform, the Ottawa Congress Centre, a crown agency with a public mandate, helps to legitimize the band and its unethical messages; and

"Whereas the Ontario Court (General Division) has ruled that Marilyn Manson's music does not meet the definitions of `obscenity' or `hate literature' in the Criminal Code;

"We, the undersigned, petition the Legislative Assembly of Ontario to call on the Liberal government of Canada to amend the Criminal Code in order to ensure that Marilyn Manson and other people directing messages of hate and derision towards vulnerable children and youth are not permitted to perform in Canada, and to ensure that messages which offend the moral and ethical sensibilities of Ontarians are not given a voice at venues financed by the taxpayers of Ontario, including the Ottawa Congress Centre."

I've affixed my own signature thereto.

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BEAR HUNTING

Mr Michael A. Brown (Algoma-Manitoulin): I have a petition signed by 166 people in Ontario which has been forwarded to me by the Ontario Federation of Anglers and Hunters. It says:

"Whereas black bear populations in Ontario are healthy, with between 75,000 and 100,000 animals, and their numbers are stable or increasing in many areas of the province; and

"Whereas black bear hunting is enjoyed by over 20,000 hunters annually in Ontario and black bears are a well-managed renewable resource; and

"Whereas hunting regulations are based on sustained yield principles and all forms of hunting are needed to optimize the socioeconomic benefits associated with hunting; and

"Whereas the value of the spring bear hunt to tourist operators in northern Ontario is $30 million annually, generating about 500 person-years of employment; and

"Whereas animal rights activists have launched a campaign of misinformation and emotional rhetoric to ban bear hunting and to end our hunting heritage in Ontario, ignoring the enormous impact this would have on the people of Ontario;

"We, the undersigned, petition the Legislative Assembly of Ontario as follows:

"That the Ontario government protect our hunting heritage and continue to support all forms of black bear hunting."

OCCUPATIONAL HEALTH AND SAFETY

Mr David Christopherson (Hamilton Centre): A petition to the Legislative Assembly of Ontario:

"Whereas workers' health and safety must be protected in the province of Ontario, especially the right to refuse work which is likely to endanger a worker, the right to know about workplace hazards and the right to participate in joint health and safety committees; and

"Whereas the Occupational Health and Safety Act and its regulations help protect workers' health and safety and workers' rights in this area; and

"Whereas the government's discussion paper, Review of the Occupational Health and Safety Act, threatens workers' health and safety by proposing to deregulate the existing act and regulations, to reduce or eliminate workers' health and safety rights and to reduce enforcement of health and safety laws by the Ministry of Labour; and

"Whereas workers must have a full opportunity to be heard about this proposed drastic erosion in their present protections from injuries and occupational diseases;

"Therefore we, the undersigned, petition the Legislative Assembly of Ontario to oppose any attempt to erode the present provisions of the Occupational Health and Safety Act and its regulations. Further we, the undersigned, demand that public hearings on the discussion paper be held in at least 20 communities throughout Ontario," not like the disgrace of Bills 99 and 136.

I add my name to theirs.

PUBLIC SERVICE AND LABOUR RELATIONS REFORM

Mr Dave Boushy (Sarnia): I have a petition from my riding signed by about 20 people.

"To the Legislative Assembly of Ontario:

"Whereas the Progressive Conservative government has failed to address the root causes of waste, duplication and unnecessary administration in our health care system; and

"Whereas the provincial government has introduced Bill 136, the Public Sector Transition Stability Act, that makes it easier for employers to reduce the number of front-line staff and to lower their salaries and benefits and thus causing further deterioration in quality patient care; and

"Whereas Bill 136 also erodes the democratic process by tampering with collective agreements and potentially interfering with workers' choice of bargaining agents;

"We, the undersigned, therefore petition the Legislative Assembly of Ontario to withdraw Bill 136, the Public Sector Transition Stability Act, and restructure the health care system in a safe, coordinated and rational way."

TFO

M. David Ramsay (Timiskaming) : _À l'Assemblée législative de l'Ontario :

_Attendu que TFO appartient aux Ontariens et Ontariennes ;

_Attendu que le gouvernement de Mike Harris a fait fi des sentiments de la population qui veut le maintien de la propriété et du financement public de TFO en tant que diffuseur éducationnel en soumettant TFO à un examen concernant sa privatisation ;

_Attendu que le gouvernement de Mike Harris n'a pas indiqué que la population participerait à part entière à l'examen concernant la privatisation ;

_Nous, soussignataires de cette pétition présentée à l'Assemblée législative de l'Ontario, demandons la tenue d'une consultation publique, ouverte et honnête auprès des Ontariens et Ontariennes avant qu'une décision sur l'avenir de TFO soit prise._

PUBLIC SERVICE AND LABOUR RELATIONS REFORM

Mr Michael Gravelle (Port Arthur): I have a petition sent to me by Carolyn High from the Lakehead Women Teachers' Association, very concerned about Bill 136. I will read the petition.

"To the Legislative Assembly of Ontario:

"Whereas the Harris government's Bill 136 will effectively suspend all labour relation rights for municipal, health and school board employees affected by provincially forced amalgamations; and

"Whereas the Harris government's Bill 136 will hurt average workers in every community across Ontario, including nurses, teachers, firemen and police officers; and

"Whereas the Harris government's bill will decrease the quality of health care as well as the quality of education delivered in Ontario; and

"Whereas the Harris government's Bill 136 was designed to provide the government with sweeping powers to override long-standing labour negotiation rights for workers, including the right to negotiate, the right to strike, the right to seek binding arbitration and the right to choose a bargaining unit;

"Therefore, be it resolved that we, the undersigned, support our MPP Michael Gravelle in his opposition to this legislation and join him in calling upon the Harris government to repeal Bill 136 which creates a climate of confrontation in Ontario."

Until we see the amendments, we will continue to not believe this government, and I am proud to sign my name to this petition.

COURT DECISION

Mr John R. Baird (Nepean): "To the Parliament of Ontario:

"Whereas at this time in the province of Ontario it is not illegal for a woman to appear topless in public, and due to the fact that this lack of restriction offends a large percentage of Ontarians;

"We, the undersigned, petition the government of Ontario to introduce legislation that would make it illegal for a woman to appear topless in any public place except in clearly marked designated beach areas."

ORDERS OF THE DAY

INTERIM SUPPLY

Hon Ernie L. Eves (Deputy Premier, Minister of Finance): I move government notice of motion number 38:

That the Minister of Finance be authorized to pay the salaries of civil servants and other necessary payments pending the voting of supply for the period commencing November 1, 1997, and ending on April 30, 1998, such payments to be charged to the proper appropriation following the voting of supply.

I am pleased to put forward this motion for interim supply, and I would note that I will be sharing my speaking time this afternoon with the member for Scarborough West, the member for Kitchener and the member for Northumberland.

As most members are aware, the motion for interim supply provides the government with the authority to make payments to hospitals, physicians, boards of education, municipalities, suppliers, civil servants and others. These payments are currently being made under the authority of a motion for interim supply which came into effect on May 1, 1997.

The motion for interim supply is required now as the authority under the existing motion expires on October 31st, 1997, and payments cannot be made after that date. Scheduled payments in earlier November include, among others, payments for general welfare, transfers to hospitals, school boards and children's aid societies.

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Mr Gerry Phillips (Scarborough-Agincourt): I am pleased to begin debate on interim supply. Just to inform you, I will be splitting my time with the member for Oriole and the member for Ottawa West.

I want to begin by saying that my leader today used the term "too far, too fast" in describing this government. I would say that what we've seen over the last week or so is perhaps a dramatic illustration of a government that I think is beginning to spin slightly out of control.

I would say that on the basis that we have now seen, with their plan to dump or download on to municipalities -- the government has finally acknowledged that they are dumping about $660 million of new costs on to the property taxpayer. That is the first thing I'd say to the people of Ontario: Recognize that this government has decided to dump about $660 million of costs that the province used to carry on to the municipalities, on to the property tax.

The second thing I would say is that not only have they dumped that on to the property taxpayer, but they've dumped many social programs that shouldn't be on the property tax. Nobody believes social housing should be on the property tax. The government has made a huge mistake here. They have dumped social housing on to the property tax. I think, frankly, it was purely a mistake. Al Leach said, "We're going to get education off the property tax," and didn't add up the numbers. When they found out what the cost was, they said, "If we want to do that, we're going to have to put social housing on to the property tax."

I would say to the public, when you hear us angry about putting social housing on, why is that? David Crombie and the government's own Who Does What panel -- Mike Harris went out and picked 15 people to give the government advice on what should be on the property tax and what should be on the province. What happened? David Crombie said, "Don't put social housing on property tax." But lo and behold, the government's doing that. It's a huge mistake.

I listened carefully to the Minister of Municipal Affairs one day on a radio interview and they said to him, "Should you be putting what's called income redistribution programs on property tax?" Al Leach said, "No, you shouldn't be doing that." Then the interviewer said, "Well, why are you putting social housing on?" He said, "We eventually would like things like that to be part of the provincial responsibility, but for the time being they're going to be on the property tax." That's the second thing where in our opinion the government is spinning slightly out of control.

The third area I want to talk a little bit about is the whole area of health. What we're finding now is that the government is closing an enormous number of hospitals across the province. My leader today had an illustration where in his own area of Ottawa the government has ordered three hospitals to close, and they're going to have to close in 1998, before the remaining hospitals will have constructed the necessary services to absorb the patients from those three closed hospitals. So even if one accepts the government's hypothesis of closing hospitals, the government has a plan that is going to cause chaos across the province, and there is no question of that.

Here in Metro I represent a Metro riding and one of the hospitals is closing November 1, I believe, certainly in November 1997, but there's been no planning of how the patients who are currently in that facility are going to be accommodated. That's the third area of chaos. It's in the health sector, where the government has created a chaotic situation.

I might add that personally I am terribly afraid the government has underestimated the future health needs for our hospital sector. We are heading one way, closing facilities, at the same time as Ontario's population is growing and aging. I can almost guarantee that in two or three years from now we're all going to be saying, "How in the world did we let that happen where we closed all those facilities without looking at the needs?"

The fourth area of chaos is property tax reform. All of us here I think should recognize that the government has embarked on the most massive change in the property tax system in the history of the province, and it has never given us, never given its back bench, never given the opposition, never given the public any indication of what the impact will be.

Mr Steve Gilchrist (Scarborough East): Zero impact.

Mr Phillips: The member for Scarborough East is, as usual, yapping, as he's wont to do. He loves to talk, he's the world's greatest talker, but no answers, because the government refuses to give any impact studies.

The amazing thing to me is this: We are going to be dealing with a property tax bill called Bill 149. It gives the Minister of Finance unprecedented powers to set tax rates. I always thought the Conservative back bench was opposed to giving that sort of tax power to a cabinet. I always thought the Conservative Party, certainly the Reform element in the Conservative Party, would have been completely, totally against that. But the bill we're going to deal with, I think this Thursday afternoon is the current schedule, calls for unprecedented power in the hands of the Minister of Finance.

We are also going to be asked to approve a bill where over half of the business property tax will be for education. We still haven't found out from the government whether it will be a uniform mill rate across the province or how that mill rate will be set, but the thing we do know is that it is going to cause chaos in our business sector. That's the fourth area.

I'm going through these massive changes. We frequently find, once the government starts on these massive changes, that it hasn't thought them through. I'll give you a couple of small examples. Al Palladini had a smiling face opening the great private sector toll road, 407. I must say it has been an artistic success. It is one of the busiest toll roads in North America. The only problem is there has never been a toll put on it. They have never opened the tolls, and the costs are adding up.

Hon Noble Villeneuve (Minister of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs, minister responsible for francophone affairs): October 14.

Mr Phillips: One of the ministers says October 14. That's only nine months late.

Mr John Gerretsen (Kingston and The Islands): Look at all the money you've lost.

Mr Phillips: Yes, all the money we've lost. The amazing thing was that the Minister of Transportation said: "We've got a problem. It's so successful we're going to have to keep it free." It's like opening a grocery store and saying, "We've got more customers than we can handle so we're going to have to give the food away until we get a new cash register." It is an embarrassment. It's like the famous boot camp opening. The day Bob Runciman was going to snip the ribbon the prisoners walked out of the boot camp. I just use these examples.

Do you remember Bill 26, the omnibus bill? We call it the bully bill. The government introduced it and said: "We want it passed right away. It's a perfect bill." Then they had to propose 150 amendments to the bill. One of the most amazing sights in all my time here in the Legislature was that the amendments had to be in at 4 o'clock.

Interjection.

Mr Phillips: I hear the Minister of Agriculture yip-yapping over here. He was talking earlier about a summer program for students in his office. What did we find? He hired a summer student, and what was he doing? He was out raising money for Mike Harris, with the taxpayers paying the bill. He had him on his staff. As a matter of fact, you had to dial the minister's office to say, "I'm prepared to give Mike Harris 200 bucks."

I just say that because perhaps I can understand these mistakes being made, but it is everywhere. It is a government that says it wants to run government like a business and it's embarrassing the business community, because everything they touch seems to fall apart.

Hon Mr Villeneuve: Don't you wish.

Mr Phillips: Don't I wish, he's saying. Unfortunately that is the case. It's a bit like last week where the government said: "We've thought through what we're going to do on this labour bill. We've been talking about this for months." So they introduced the labour bill, and before we have even had a chance to get it to committee, the government says, "We are going to make massive changes in it." And then you know something, Mr Speaker? They say, "We won't tell you what they are, though, until after the public hearings, because we certainly wouldn't want people coming to those public hearings debating what we're going to do with the bill." It is absurd.

I hope the public understands the frustration. The government gives us a bill and says, "Go to a public hearing so people can come and debate and give input into the bill, but I will tell you," the government said just last week, "we're going to make sweeping changes in the bill, but we won't tell you what they are until after you've had the public hearings." It's a sham, it's an embarrassment. What are we doing here? We're going to waste the taxpayers' money. They are going to pay to have those committees staffed, to have the Hansards done, to have all of that expense going on, having people come from around the province to present, thinking that they are having some input into a bill when they haven't even been told what the major content of the bill is.

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Yesterday we had the Minister of Education put out a huge bill on education, and a great public relations exercise, I must say. A lot of money spent on the graphics, and he had his hair combed, always has a good-looking suit on, slick as can be, great speech, believe me, and the signs in behind well-rehearsed. Al Palladini would hire John Snobelen in a minute. He could put him on the used car lot and the car lot would be empty, because this guy can sell anything. But I just say to the public, why are we so sceptical? It is because the minister says, "This is about improving the quality of education, but I'm going to take $1 billion out of education."

I come from a Metropolitan Toronto constituency and I can tell you that one of the reasons Metropolitan Toronto has worked, and there's no question of this, is that there has been a quality of schools in our neighbourhoods. We are blessed in Metropolitan Toronto. We do not have downtown neighbourhoods where people have a concern about their education system.

People do not mind. They like to live in the core of the urban area, and one of the reasons is you can be sure of a quality education in your local schools. That doesn't come cheap. It requires resources, and it requires resources that may not be needed in other neighbourhoods that don't have the same demands put on them. I can guarantee that the future of our major urban centres depends heavily on a quality education system, where people can feel that "Regardless of what neighbourhood I'm in, I can send my child to the local school and be assured of a quality education system."

I know what the government's all about. They want to cut education spending. They've got to do it. The Common Sense Revolution --

Mr Michael A. Brown (Algoma-Manitoulin): That pays for the tax cut.

Mr Phillips: My friend says they have to pay for the tax cut, and that's exactly the case. They said, "We are going to cut a billion and a half dollars out of public education and that's what we need to pay for our tax cut." When the public see us concerned about the rhetoric around the education bill, it is because we know in behind it the real motive.

I was duped. I went to one of John Snobelen's press conferences just before Christmas where he said: "We're going to maintain education spending for 1997. We're not going to make any further cuts." I went away feeling fairly good. It was only a couple of days later I got looking at all the numbers and I realized they weren't going to make any further cuts because they had several weeks before announced a $500-million cut for 1997. The reason I raise that is, Mr Speaker, you can imagine the scepticism that we in the opposition and I think many in education have when we listen to Mr Snobelen talking about education. I have a saying: Don't listen to what Mike Harris says, watch what he does.

I go through all of those things. I go through also on the job front. I can remember Mike Harris saying, "Don't worry about youth unemployment." Here we have a document that came out last Friday from the Ministry of Finance. You probably can't see it, Mr Speaker, because it's fairly small print, but it shows the youth unemployment rate for the first eight months of 1997. We're two thirds of the way through 1997.

The youth unemployment rate, 18%; the same period a year ago, the first eight months of 1996, the youth unemployment rate, 15.6%: up dramatically from 15.6% to 18%. By the way, I've looked at unemployment rates for the last 20 years. The only other time it was close to that was in 1992, the heart of the recession. This is like a record level and dramatically higher than the rest of Canada.

As we are being asked here to approve the government's spending, I would just say to the people of Ontario, we have a government that is close to out of control and it is shaking every single major institution in this province. Our hospitals are being shaken to their core. Our entire school system has been taken over by Mike Harris. Make no mistake, Mike Harris now runs the Ontario school system. The trustees are frankly close to irrelevant. They've dumped on to our property taxes the most sensitive social services and nobody -- Dave Crombie particularly said, "The panel strongly opposes such a move." They were unanimous in the view that they shouldn't do it. The property tax changes are coming without having thought through their implications, and they are going to hit, mark my words, next April in a way that is unimaginable right now.

As I wind up my comments and turn it over to my colleagues, I just say that it was two years and a few months ago that people gave Mike Harris a majority government, and we in the Liberal caucus understand that he has the right to govern. But he doesn't have the right to destroy the very fabric that has been built by parties, including the Conservative Party, over these many years, and we believe that's exactly what's happening.

Mr David Caplan (Oriole): I would like to thank the people of Oriole for their support, for the privilege of serving them in this assembly. It is an awesome responsibility and I very humbly stand as their representative here.

On September 4 voters in Oriole sent an overwhelming message to this government and to this House. By a two-to-one margin, unheard of in Oriole, nearly 60% of the people in Oriole said, "You are going too far, too fast." They want someone to start to listen to their concerns. They want someone to start to act for their interests.

As I went door to door -- and I know that the Premier was afraid to meet one voter in Oriole, because had he, he would have heard the same messages that I did. There is considerable anger, there is fear, and perhaps the most disappointing thing is there's a great deal of cynicism directed at the actions and inactions of this provincial government.

The issues that the people of Oriole had on a provincial basis but which struck very close to home -- and I will tell you, Mr Speaker, and I will tell this House, that I did not find one family, not one household which has not been affected very strongly by the actions of this government. They told me that they're afraid. They're afraid that the health care they need will not be there when they need it after closing 11 hospitals in Metropolitan Toronto and the resulting increase in capacity at our local hospital, North York General, without the kind of support and the funding that is required.

In North York we're very lucky to have an internationally recognized education system. They see that being threatened. People of Oriole are saying: "Why is this government taking dollars away from our children? Why are they getting rid of a board of education which provides a quality service as recognized by this Minister of Education?"

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The third issue that came through very strongly was in relation to Bill 103 and the megacity. The people of Oriole were telling me that this government did not listen to their voices. I had a woman on Hawleaf Crescent literally shout at the top of her lungs that she no longer lives in a democracy, that she doesn't know why she should go and vote when she goes in a referendum, the same referendum that Mike Harris votes in, and it's totally ignored by a government which does not care.

It goes even further because of the proposals, as my colleague had spoken of earlier, to download services which were previously paid for by the province on to the backs of homeowners, of residents. The resulting property tax increases are just enormous and unfair, and it's a burden which the people of Oriole are rejecting. They're saying, "No more."

Finally, an issue which came through so very loud and clear: tenants in Oriole, 50% of the people of Oriole, saying that the only tenant protection afforded in the proposed Bill 96 is that which is in the title, that there is no tenant protection, that this government's actions belie their words. Unfortunately, that is a sentiment that came through. One tenant said to me that they don't know what they're going to do, because she and her three children don't want to become prisoners in their own home. That's effectively what's going to happen with this legislation. I did request, and I renew my call, that the minister withdraw that piece of legislation.

The people of Oriole were saying that they don't believe this government can be trusted to protect their interests, because they've been shunted away. They've been told: "We don't have to listen to you, because you're a special interest. If you're a parent, if you or a family member requires hospital care, if you're a renter, if you're a senior, you are a special interest and we no longer need to listen to you." Time and time again people have said that is offensive. Quite clearly, the people of Oriole are not buying what Mike Harris is selling. You can package it any way you like, but we're not buying it.

We had significant local issues, and I would like to highlight a few if I may. The first issue is Song Meadoway. If you recall, in August 1996 there was a tragic accident. A gravel truck went off a ramp into a townhome, and a young woman, Kim Wong, was killed and her two children injured. Then 364 days later, the Minister of Transportation drops a letter committing to the erection of the barrier. I want to say that the people of Song Meadoway will not sleep until that barrier is completed. In fact, there was a meeting last night, which I attended, where the plans were unveiled. There is potentially a significant problem, and I hope the government is listening and that they are committed to ensuring that this community is protected and afforded the kind of respect and protection we all enjoy for ourselves and our children.

The Oriole community centre is another local issue for us. It is right in the very heart of our community on Don Mills Road. I can't tell you the number of different programs that are run out of that centre and the fears and concerns because of the downloading this government is proposing, because they don't know if they'll be able to operate this kind of support. They need expanded services, not less. I would very much ask that the government commit to ensuring that we have proper community facilities, that they are staffed, that people can go there and access them. Unfortunately, that is sorely lacking.

Our community in Oriole is incredibly diverse. Certainly men and women, young and old, but I'm told that over 50 languages and dialects are spoken in Oriole. The Minister of Education has spoken about the need to meet student needs and the need to focus spending on students. People in Oriole just cannot understand, after $533 million has been stolen from children, with a further $1 billion to come, just how the needs of their children are going to be met, particularly those in the heritage or, as it's now called, the international language program. I implore this government to affirm and to commit today to full and adequate funding for a very competitive and very important school program.

Seniors are also a very large component of Oriole. The ripoff for drug payment, Bill 96, the municipal downloading forcing either higher property taxes or long-term care on to municipalities, hospital closures: Seniors are saying, "Enough is enough." It's time to start respecting the people who built our community.

It's important that we all reflect on why we are in this place. It is our local needs. It is the people who have built our community, all of the communities across Ontario. Unfortunately, we've had a government which seeks to minimize people, which, as Oscar Wilde once put it, knows the cost of everything and the value of nothing.

Our communities are beyond price. We can in fact have pride in them. We can in fact want to build something and build on top of what we have: not tear it apart, not remove it, but build.

When I have a mother in Oriole say to me, "Will my child not be able to go to junior kindergarten?" because 24 boards of education dropped junior kindergarten in Ontario last year because of the direct decision of this government to make it non-mandatory and to also remove the funding, that's a real concern. I hope the government is listening, and I hope they're going to act, and I hope they're going to give some assurance to the people of my community, who say that we need these programs, that these are important, that they are our future.

My commitment to my constituents, to the members of my community in Oriole, is that I will work, as I have in the past, to bring public openness and public accountability to what happens in this place and what happens across Ontario. If I can relate a very brief example of that, as a former school trustee for our local neighbourhood I ensured public participation in our budgeting process. I said: "Let's take it away from this building. Let's go out and meet people. More importantly, let's listen; let's engage in a dialogue."

We've seen that this government does not want to engage in such a dialogue. It introduces time allocation motions. It says, "We're going to go to four communities." It says: "We're going to pick and choose who we're going to listen to. We don't want you to see the contents of what we're going to be debating." That is a total sham, it is a total embarrassment and it is a disgrace.

The absolute success that we enjoyed as a board of education, because we brought people in, because we opened our doors, because we went outside to seek opinion, because we listened, is a testament to what can happen when people work together. You see, the people of Oriole, indeed the people of Ontario, are resources that we need to tap; they are not obstacles to be overcome.

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As I've said, listening is perhaps the key in a dialogue, any dialogue. One party speaks but the other party listens. What I heard at the doors was that people felt that nobody is listening, that nobody cares, that they have something to sell but they don't know if they want to buy. They're receptive. They want to work together.

The people of Oriole have built something very special, and they're saying: "Why is nobody listening when we take the time to get involved in our community on a local level, on a provincial level? Why is the province not prepared to listen to our concerns? Why are they not prepared to act on our concerns?" That's a very sad commentary on the direction this government has chosen.

As I said earlier, the cynicism is perhaps the most disheartening aspect of what I heard at the doors. This is a time in our history when we should be engaging people. Right now, we seem more intent on shutting them out. I must say to all the members of this House, but particularly members of the government, that people will vote with their feet.

To build the kind of province and the kind of communities we have right now, we have brought people together, we have looked for new ideas. No one has said, "I have the source of all ideas and knowledge." Together we can work, but there must be a willingness, there must be an openness, there must be an honest attempt to solicit opinion, to listen and to act. That's not happening.

To the people of Oriole I say very clearly, I will always be there when you need me. Should the need arise, I want to assure my bosses that I will work my hardest, I will try to solve problems, I will always, always respond.

Finally, what is this place all about and what is the purpose of this assembly? It's to build something. It is to build a brighter future not only for our young people but for all of us. When I go to a household and they tell me that their kids, who are college- or university-trained, cannot find work -- when they are told there are all these jobs being created, they ask me where they are. There are résumés that young, bright, energetic, hardworking people have. They want to give them to employers but they can't find them. "Where are these jobs?" they ask me. I have to answer that, unfortunately, no one is willing to tell us. There's a lot of bravado but very little action and very little result.

We have a problem in the province with 18% unemployed youth, but even worse, I'm told that the percentage of underemployed young people is close to reaching those proportions. This is a significant problem and nobody seems to want to tackle it, nobody seems to want to address it. It is at all of our peril if we do not make the investment in our young people. This is our future. These are our future leaders. These are our future taxpayers. Why won't the government do something? Why the foot-dragging? Why the silence? The people of Oriole want to know.

As I said earlier, we've seen slickness, we've seen packaging, we've seen promises, but they've been broken. Behind the façade there's just a bunch of guys with slicked-back hair pulling the strings. We're not buying it. We are not buying what this government is selling us. You can package it any way you like, but the people of Oriole know the real thing when they see it, and it has not been presented. There has been no attempt to meet the needs of the people of my community.

It is incumbent upon this government and this assembly to say: "Yes, we will make the necessary investment. Yes, we will listen. Yes, we will act on your behalf." I urge the government to say yes to parents, say yes to seniors, especially say yes to tenants. Tell them. Show them. Actions speak louder than words. Make sure that our communities remain vibrant and that we have the ability to grow.

I will shortly turn the floor over to my colleague from Ottawa West. I would just like to reiterate and thank the people of Oriole for the privilege they have granted me. My energy and my dedication are theirs, and I hope I can represent them well in this House.

Mr Alex Cullen (Ottawa West): As I stand in my place today, I welcome this, my first opportunity to speak to the Legislature, on the matter of interim supply. Interim supply is the motion that permits taxpayers' money to be spent by the government of the day, as approved by the taxpayers and elected representatives in this Legislature.

I was recently elected as the representative for the people in Ottawa West to this Legislature, indeed by a majority of the voters in Ottawa West, to speak here on their behalf. This is an honour and a responsibility that I take very seriously. I can tell this assembly that I have been humbled by the confidence given to me by the electors in my community in Ottawa West.

Ottawa West has been in its present form for over 30 years. It will change significantly in the next provincial election when the new boundaries take effect. It's an older suburban riding in the city of Ottawa, built primarily after the Second World War. In fact, as I discovered after 15 years of knocking on doors in that community, there are many seniors who originally built their homes in Ottawa West some 40 years ago, raised families there, built the community facilities, paid their taxes and are now retiring in place. In fact, Ottawa West, while having its fair share of singles and families and young people, has more seniors per capita than any other community in Canada except for Victoria, British Columbia.

In general, Ottawa West is fairly representative of urban Ontario, still largely anglophone, with a small but growing ethnic diversity. It has a residential home ownership character. Nearly half of my riding is populated by relatively well-off, older and well-educated residents as a reflection, in part, of being in a government town. However, more than half of my riding lives in rental accommodation, where the population tends to be younger and less well off. In fact, over a quarter of my riding, some 10,000 people, live in social housing, a combination of both Ontario public housing and City Living and other social housing providers, encompassing seniors on fixed incomes, the disabled and families, including new Canadians and single parents.

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I can tell you, as a former school board trustee in the community of Ottawa West for six years and as a former city and regional councillor, also for six years, that the residents of Ottawa West value greatly their quality of life. They live in a clean, safe community with excellent public and private services, ready access to green space, good schools, good hospitals, good transit, good water, roads and sewers, and good community facilities. They expect their tax dollars to be spent wisely. They do not begrudge providing these tax dollars to pay for the services in the community to support their quality of life. They may not all agree on the specific details on what or how their money should be spent -- and believe you me, I am quite aware of it -- but they do expect their elected representatives at all levels not only to preserve their quality of life but also to take advantage of the opportunities to improve their quality of life at reasonable cost.

This brings me to the by-election in Ottawa West. It would be too easy to trivialize my comments regarding this by-election as simply partisan. When 21,000 people vote in a summer by-election and two thirds of them reject the government's candidate, I believe we must respect their democratic decision and seek to understand it.

The number one issue that dominated the discussion at every doorstep I encountered in that by-election was health care. People are concerned about our current health care system, the level of care today, access to treatment and the growing waiting lists, the amount of time spent in hospital, the availability and adequacy of home care, the growing need for palliative care and long-term care. With the cuts this government has made to health care to date, even before considering the issue of hospital closures, people in Ottawa West were concerned and remain concerned about the viability of our current health care system. This was clearly evident by the voters' reaction to hospital closures in Ottawa-Carleton. The Health Services Restructuring Commission's proposed closures of the Grace and Riverside hospitals will affect residents in Ottawa West. Not only is our community growing but it is aging as well, therefore increasing our need for adequate and accessible health care. While all can agree that we must make better use of our resources and facilities, the public in Ottawa West has not accepted this government's imposed solution of closing community health care facilities as an improvement. They see longer waiting lists, not shorter, as the result, and they are not willing to accept reductions in the quality of care.

There are other problems that result from this government's approach to health care. Not all the money from the over $100 million in savings from closing the Grace and Riverside hospitals, from shutting down the Elisabeth Bruyère Health Centre, from downsizing the Montfort Hospital, are being reinvested by this government back into the community. Indeed only $41.5 million of that $100 million has been designated by the Minister of Health for reinvestment, and it still falls far short of the community's needs for long-term care, palliative care and home care. This is simply not acceptable.

Of the $128 million in hospital renovations that this government has announced are necessary -- covering, mind you, only acute care, not our needs in terms of palliative care or home care or long-term care -- this government expects the local community to cover at least 25% of these costs, another burden for the local property taxpayer. And the time lines -- hospitals to stop admitting in May of next year, a mere eight months away -- are completely unrealistic given that the necessary renovations have not even started. The Health Services Restructuring Commission made it abundantly clear that the replacement programs had to be in place before any closures were to proceed, and this is simply not happening in Ottawa-Carleton. It is no wonder that the voters in Ottawa West lack confidence in this government.

Then there is the issue of education, an issue near and dear to my heart, given my experience as a parent, as a volunteer in our school system and as a former trustee with the Ottawa Board of Education. In this area, parents are painfully aware that this government has cut funding so deeply that despite Mike Harris's election promise not to affect classroom spending, we see school boards in Ottawa-Carleton and elsewhere in this province being forced to cut junior kindergarten, cut class size, cut teachers' aides, cut special education for children with learning disabilities, cut busing and children's safety, cut libraries and cut school supplies. It is all too painfully clear to parents that this government is far more interested in finding money for an ill-conceived income tax cut than in improving the quality of education for our children. The parents told me they are not willing to accept the government's price of school closures and program cuts in exchange for a provincial income tax cut. Parents in Ottawa West too have lost confidence in this government's ability to manage this important responsibility.

Another issue that is important to the voters in Ottawa West is the cost of provincial downloading on to local property taxpayers. Due to my previous position as a member of council for the regional municipality of Ottawa-Carleton, this is a topic with which I have some familiarity. We know that the Harris government is having some difficulty in making this initiative work. They are now working on plan D. Plan A, announced back in January, had to be abandoned as simply unworkable; plan B, announced in May, couldn't fly; plan C, released this August, still didn't add up; and now plan D is being worked on as we speak. It involves a massive shift of funding responsibilities from the provincial level to the municipal level, from provincial income taxpayers to local property taxpayers, in a manner that is supposed to be revenue-neutral; as we all know in this assembly, in its current form it simply is not, certainly for the taxpayers in Ottawa-Carleton.

According to the numbers released by the government following a meeting with the large cities mayors' caucus this past August, local property taxpayers in Ottawa-Carleton are to assume some $277 million in additional funding responsibilities for social housing, public transit, property assessment, provincial highway transfers, community health programs, social assistance, the drug benefit program, community ambulances, child care and community libraries, while absorbing losses in provincial funding. At the same time, some $185 million is to be removed from the local property tax base through the provincial assumption of half the residential education property tax. The net additional cost to Ottawa-Carleton property taxpayers has been estimated by the region, and confirmed by the numbers issued by the government, to be about $92 million having to be funded by the local property tax base. Their property tax burden in Ottawa-Carleton is not being reduced, as was promised by this government; in this shell game it actually increases at a rate of over $250 per household in Ottawa-Carleton.

This government has a credibility problem. It has yet to come up with figures showing that its proposals are indeed revenue-neutral, despite announcing this initiative some nine months ago. It is competing with another level of responsible government, recognized as closer to the people, which also has the expertise to provide responsible estimates of the impacts of this government's proposals on their communities. Taxpayers know, transition fund or no transition fund, that if this government insists on pursuing its ill-conceived plan, taxes will increase or services will be cut. One thing I can tell you, after 12 years in local government --

Interjections.

Mr Cullen: Madam Speaker, I seem to have provoked a response from the other side. I can tell you, after 12 years in local government, that people don't like to see their services cut, and they will remember why they were cut.

This leads me to an issue that is important to a significant portion of my riding, and that is the future of social housing. As I mentioned earlier, Ottawa West has over 10,000 residents living in social housing.

Interjection.

The Acting Speaker (Mrs Margaret Marland): The member for Kingston and The Islands.

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Mr Cullen: Madam Speaker, I need all the help I can get from my colleagues. They are here to help me.

Social housing is an important part of Canada's social safety net. It is affordable housing to seniors on a fixed income, to the disabled and to low-income families, particularly those headed by single mothers. It is being placed at risk by this government's plan to download its responsibility to local property taxpayers. The municipalities, all of them, have made it abundantly clear they do not have the ability to fund, from their property tax base, the subsidies needed to render this housing affordable to the people who need it most: the elderly, the disabled, families with low incomes, children from low-income families.

Further, they don't have the funds to finance the necessary capital renovations and upgrades this housing requires. What the government has announced in terms of transitional funding for capital upgrades is a mere pittance compared to the needs out there in the community. I believe it works out to less than $1,000 per unit of social housing, barely enough for a paint job.

It is therefore absolutely understandable that the federal government, which itself is engaged in negotiations with the provinces to devolve the management, not the funding but the management, of its responsibility in social housing to the provincial governments, has suspended its negotiations with this government because of these very concerns.

As well, social housing providers and tenants fear the downloading of social housing to municipalities will lead to unaffordable rent increases and restrictions to access to this needed housing by the very clientele it is meant to serve as the over 300 municipalities in Ontario that have social housing in this province struggle to control their costs, combined with the other costs of downloading, leading ultimately to a checkerboard Ontario in terms of accessibility and affordability.

Residents in my riding, those who live in social housing and those who understand its importance, believe this government's ill-advised proposals to download social housing to municipalities is, to paraphrase David Crombie, chair of the province's own Who Does What commission, both wrong in theory and devastating in practice.

There are of course other issues that people in Ottawa West spoke to me about during the by-election. I certainly heard about rent control, about the fact that the government's proposals for rent control in effect abolish rent control over time, as we all know in this House. We also heard about the environment, that the government's proposals dealing with land planning and land use planning don't serve to protect our precious resource known as green space and the environment -- and child care, and youth employment. These were issues I heard at the door.

But consistently and overwhelmingly, people said to me that this government, the Mike Harris government, was going too far, too fast. Over and over again at the door -- senior, young parent, middle-aged parents seeking to put their children through university, young person looking for work -- all said to me, "Too far, too fast." They all recognized that the Harris government was indeed elected in the summer of 1995 to deal with the debt and the deficit, that some cuts had to be made, but overwhelmingly they rejected hospital closures, education cuts and provincial downloading as the price to pay for that vaunted provincial income tax cut. They would rather the government spend its time ensuring that health care services were available for all who needed them, young and old, for today and tomorrow.

I have to tell you of the elderly lady in her eighties I met on Melbourne Avenue during the campaign who told me at the door how she was sent home after being treated for a stroke and arrived at home requiring home care and finding none available to her. She had to wait. She had to rely on friends and family who weren't living in her community to provide that service until that could come, and when it came it was inadequate to her needs.

I must tell you of the gentleman in his 50s living on a disability pension who was trying to look after his daughter, dying of a brain tumour, brain cancer, in his home. This is an adult female, living in his home, he on disability because of a back problem, not getting sufficient home care to look after his daughter who needed constant medical attention while suffering from the ravages of this cancer. Again, inadequate service, inadequate health care.

Here we're dealing with a government that is not putting back enough of the savings it is taking away from the health care system in Ottawa-Carleton, not reinvesting all that money, not even coming close to meeting the needs of the community in Ottawa West.

The residents in Ottawa West would much rather that funding for education was better spent in the classroom, not simply cut for ulterior purposes. They do not accept that spending for special education for children with special needs must be sacrificed for an income tax cut that even the government opposite's friends on Bay Street tell them is unaffordable at this time. That is why this government continues to have the same credit rating as the previous government, and the previous government, after having its credit rating lowered four times.

The residents in Ottawa West would much rather see this government seek change through consensus rather than confrontation. How many times have we seen confrontation, the byword of this government, as opposed to working with the population it's elected to serve? Too many times they've sought to divide and conquer, to treat people living in the community as special interest groups.

They showed very clearly their opinion of this government, their lack of confidence in this government through their vote on September 4.

I believe politics is indeed the art of the possible. I believe we can look at politics in terms of not only the art -- we have many practitioners around here -- but as the science because we are here to determine how to appropriately meet the needs of our community with the resources we have. I mention that phrase with some familiarity, given my background in economics. Of course it has been said many times: You get two economists, you get three opinions, and I'm sure we're going to hear many of them in this assembly.

But I do believe, as a member of this provincial Parliament, that we have many roles to play in shaping public policy and in serving our constituents. We have not only a role to speak out for our constituents on matters of public policy; we have a role to provide a human face to the process of politics in our community, to go and consult with our community, to go and give them the avenue to participate in the shaping of public policy here in this assembly and with the government.

As a former bureaucrat, I know what kind of challenge that is, not only for the community but for ourselves in this assembly. I also know, and this may come as a shock to some, that wisdom can be found in all parties, although in my view more of it is found in some parties than in others.

I look forward to participating in future debates in this assembly and I can only hope, as I am sure has been the hope of all those who have entered here, that my words will have a positive influence in shaping the policies that are to serve the people we represent in Ontario.

In closing, I consider this to be an honour, to be able to stand here in this place and address my views and the views of my constituents to the members assembled here. I can only hope, to reiterate, that I will play some small part in advancing the future of this great province.

Mr Gilles Bisson (Cochrane South): On a point of order, Madam Speaker --

The Acting Speaker: Before you do the point of order, I was just going to congratulate both our new members on their maiden speeches.

The member for Cochrane South has a point of order.

Mr Bisson: Madam Speaker, I join you in congratulating the new members on these their maiden speeches.

We have I believe an all-party agreement that the New Democratic caucus will split its time between, first of all, Mr Pouliot from Lake Nipigon, and second of all, myself. We're going to start with Mr Pouliot, we're then going to go to the government for its 20-minute rotation and rotate back to us yet again 20 minutes after the Tories.

Mr Gerretsen: On a point of order, Madam Speaker: I don't believe we've had questions and comments yet, as is provided for in the rules.

The Acting Speaker: Absolutely, but I was taking a point of order, which has precedence over my starting the rotation of questions and comments. So we will now proceed, with your help, to questions and comments.

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Mr Allan K. McLean (Simcoe East): I'd like to take the opportunity to congratulate the two members on their maiden speeches. I remember some 16 1/2 years ago when I was new to this Legislature and I had the opportunity to do the same thing. It was quite an exciting day and it's a day that you never forget. To see the new members make their first speech here in the Legislature is something they and their families will not forget because it's a pretty proud day.

To relate to some of the issues they raised with regard to the future of this province, I think we've got to be fairly positive in the first speeches about what we really feel this province is and the direction this province is heading. I know there were several years of neglect, and this government of the day is trying to rectify some of those problems. So I say to the new members, you want to read your history, figure out what happened in the past and look forward to a prosperous future.

They made some comments with regard to the changes in administration in municipalities, how they are going to affect the municipalities, who is going to be responsible for what services and how the shift of responsibility is going to take place. I think what we've seen here in the last several months with regard to the shift of responsibilities will be positive and will put the province in a positive position for the future. When we look at the many aspects of the shift of responsibilities, for many years as a municipal politician I was hoping that one day we'd get the total cost of education off the property tax. I thought we were finally doing that until AMO came along and came back with their recommendations that they only wanted half taken off.

I commend the members today for their maiden speeches and look forward to hearing from them in the future.

The Acting Speaker: The Chair made an error originally in going to the member for Simcoe East. I apologize to the member for Cochrane South because I did not see you standing. We will go back to you now and then go to the Liberals.

Mr Bisson: Thank you very much, Madam Speaker. I want to take this opportunity, as you did earlier, to congratulate the newly elected members of the assembly from the Liberal caucus, who had the opportunity on this, their maiden speech. I think the tradition in this House is, and should always remain, that when members come in, we have an opportunity to congratulate them on their speeches.

Truly in this case it was quite interesting. This is not something you would think opposition parties would say about each other, but I thought they were on topic and they gave a fairly well reasoned response to the motion here before us today in regard to interim supply. They brought it back to what they saw on the doorstep. I think what these two members saw on the doorstep is the same thing that Mr Wayne Lessard saw in Windsor, that there is a lot of anxiety and a lot of fear, I guess would also be a good word, on the part of constituents in regard to what this government is doing. However, I would not argue that it's a question that this government is going too far and too fast; I would argue they're going in the wrong direction.

There are a lot of people who worry: "What is going to happen in Mike Harris's Ontario two or three years from now when it comes to my children's education? Will I be able to afford, as a middle-class parent, to send my kid off to college or university in this new Ontario that Mike Harris is reshaping?"

Mr Bill Grimmett (Muskoka-Georgian Bay): Sell your cat.

Mr Bisson: The member across the way in the government says, "Sell your cat." I will not sell my cat. Fluffy the cat has been around for a long time and is going to stay at my house.

The fear people have is that in Mike Harris's Ontario they are not going to have the ability to participate in our economy as full citizens, because many of the measures they are undertaking are turning our province into a situation where those with money will do quite fine and those who, like most of us, are average, middle-income earners are going to find it increasingly difficult to find our place within this economy. So I think they're going in the wrong direction.

Mr Gerretsen: I too want to congratulate the new members for Oriole and Ottawa West on their excellent maiden speeches. It gives those of us who have been here now for over two years an idea as to how the people on the doorsteps are still reacting to what this government is doing. I completely concur. From canvassing with one of the candidates, I heard the same concerns at the doorstep.

I also agree with my colleague from the NDP. I think this government is heading in a completely wrong direction. When you think about it, the United Nations has voted Canada the number one country in the world from a quality-of-life viewpoint over the last two or three years. I always believe that quality of life talks about a lot of things, but certainly good government programs have an awful lot to do with that. So here we're voted number one in the world on an annual basis, yet this government is trying to take a lot of those good government programs and either tear them apart completely or do away with them completely. That is certainly the assessment a lot of people have had at the door and that a lot of Ontarians have had as well.

I also found it very interesting to listen to the member for Ottawa West about health care in general. He has given us an example where $100 million has been taken out of health care in that community, and according to his research, only $41 million has been reinvested. We've heard the Minister of Health say here on a day-to-day basis, "All the money we're saving as a result of restructuring we're putting back in." So far, in Ottawa anyway, they are $59 million short. If you don't believe me, ask the people who need health care services on a day-to-day basis and they will certainly tell you, from the kinds of services they're getting in the hospitals and in the health care field, that it just isn't there any more with all the cutbacks your government has been involved in.

I congratulate both members on excellent opening speeches.

The Acting Speaker: Further questions and comments? The New Democratic Party. If we had been in rotation correctly, you would have had the second question and comments.

Mr Bisson: I would like to accommodate the parliamentary assistant.

The Acting Speaker: That's fine, as long as you understand we're doing that.

Ms Isabel Bassett (St Andrew-St Patrick): I would like to extend my congratulations to the two new members for Oriole and Ottawa West. I know there's a tradition in this Legislature to be courteous and welcoming, which we are very much to your arrival here. That said, however, I would like to point out a few inaccuracies in what you have said.

We believe that Ontario is headed on the right track. Since this government took office, the economy has improved in Ontario, and Ontarians are believing it. For example, an Angus Reid poll in July of this year showed that Ontarians, more than any other people in provinces elsewhere in Canada, believe that Ontario is doing well and that their quality of life is improving.

Second, in terms of other surveys, we see that more Ontarians say they believe that the forecasts for Ontario are improving. All private forecasters say that Ontario's economy is going to outstrip that of other provinces and most private forecasters expect Ontario and Alberta to have the fastest-growing economies in 1997. Over the first seven months of 1997, Ontario's merchandise exports rose 6.8% from the same period a year ago.

All in all, what has happened is that Ontarians are sensing that our fiscal programs and plans are working. The fact that we have cut the deficit from 11.2% when we came in to 6.6% today is sending out a message that we know how to control and manage our money.

Mr Caplan: Madam Speaker, on a point of order: I seek leave from the House for unanimous consent to split the two-minute response between one minute for myself and one minute for the member for Ottawa West.

The Acting Speaker: Agreed? Agreed. The member for Oriole first, then?

Mr Caplan: No, the member for Ottawa West first.

Mr Cullen: I am very pleased that my comments have provoked a response from the other side. That's precisely the purpose of the by-election in Ottawa West. For a summer by-election, we had a 48% turnout of the residents in Ottawa West, and I think the message is very clear.

If the government continues to cling to its line that all is well and that it's on the right track, then obviously there is something wrong in the water we drink in Ottawa West, and having been a member of regional council I can tell you we drink excellent water in Ottawa West.

I would like to simply offer to my colleagues, those of you who were mentioning in your remarks the position of the Association of Municipalities of Ontario -- of course I have participated in the deliberations of that body and I can tell you it is very, very clear: Property tax was never meant to cover the costs of income transfer programs such as social assistance and social housing, never.

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Mr Caplan: I would offer my colleagues opposite the actual results of the by-election, because that is the most accurate temperature of what the public feels about this or any other government. I can assure you that when 60% of the people of Oriole reject what this government has done and what it has not done, no set of projections, no set of temperature-taking by anonymous pollsters replaces the actual votes of real, live people. As individuals who have gone to the polls, who have stood as representatives, you should understand that better than anyone. I hope this government continues to rely on that kind of flawed information, because when people speak, that is when things really happen in this province. They spoke very clearly in Oriole.

The Acting Speaker: Just before the member for Lake Nipigon rises, earlier the member for Cochrane South asked that the time for the New Democratic caucus be split between the member for Cochrane South and the member for Lake Nipigon, but you wanted to rotate the government party in between your equal split. I should have asked if there was unanimous consent of the House to do that. I'm now asking that. Is it agreed, therefore, and the member for Lake Nipigon is going first? Agreed.

Mr Gilles Pouliot (Lake Nipigon): I thank the members of the House.

First and foremost, I too would wish to commend the two new members. They've done an outstanding job in articulating what they heard on the doorsteps when they interfaced, when they met with their constituents. I want to wish them well and I want to wish them a long and active tenure at Queen's Park, representing in the most honourable fashion their respective constituents and ridings.

Interim supply allows members a latitude which is not afforded on other matters. Some may wish to deviate from time to time, address the people who got them elected, their supporters, the people of their ridings.

Every day, the Harris government takes credit for all the good economic deeds across Ontario. There isn't a day where you don't have a press release where the government says, "We and we alone are responsible for the economic recovery." The Harris government believes the mantra that the manifesto, the Common Sense Revolution, is the sole message that Ontarians must hear. The Harris government believes that the two previous administrations, those of the Liberals and of the NDP, resulted in 10 lost years, that they alone have a right, a monopoly on the welfare of Ontarians.

You have witnessed over the past two years an arrogance, a toughness never before displayed by any government in the annals of Ontario, to the point where if you are marginalized, if you are vulnerable, if you are a small-wage earner, if you are mentally and/or physically challenged, if you are poor, if you are a young person looking for employment, if you are an elder, you don't quite fit the agenda. Your lot will be less, so that the lot of the one-, two- and three-percenters will improve. Their wealth is galloping. They now control a larger percentage of wealth, command higher wages than ever before, at the expense of all of us.

The erosion of the middle class is palpable; it is concrete; you can feel it. The anxiety has led to fear. People do not have the same faith in the future they once had. Welcome to Mike Harris's Ontario.

Let me share with you a letter that was handed to me yesterday in my office from a resident of Kitche-Nuhmay-Koosib, Big Trout Lake, in the riding of Lake Nipigon.

"Hello and welcome to Big Trout Lake. My name is Reverend Alan Hartley. I am 72 years old. I have been a reverend since 1974 with St Peter's Anglican Church in Trout. I lived in my father's 27-year-old structure building for a few years, which gets colder in winter months."

You see, Reverend Hartley, 72 years of age, a resident of Big Trout Lake, one of our first Canadians, lives with his daughter and his granddaughter. The unit is 672 square feet.

"I survive from the source of income I receive every month for old-age assistance from the government of Canada, Gains from the province of Ontario and a retirement pension from the Anglican Church of Canada." Keep in mind, Canada, Ontario, 1997.

"My heating costs are quite high every year, buying wood three times a week from the local people, which costs $35 per load, totalling $105 per week. My electricity bill is between $200 and $400 per month during winter."

Suffice it to say anyone who is familiar with the geography of our vast and magnificent land here in Ontario knows it is very cold for very long in the community of Big Trout Lake.

Total expenses for wood and electricity were $820 per month. The telephone bill was around $70 per month and the sewage bill, because they do have sewer and water -- our government installed the sewer and water when we had the opportunity to serve the province, so it's less of a problem, but nevertheless there are charges associated with that essential service, $40 per month. Other expenses -- groceries and clothing -- are approximately $500 a month.

Every commodity has to be flown in. A litre of gas, unleaded, is 90 cents, but if you pay at the end of the month because you don't have the cash, it's $1.10 per litre. The majority of residents in Big Trout Lake pay at the end of the month because they simply don't have the cash during the month. So it's $1.10 per litre.

Total estimated expenses are $1,430 a month; total sources of income, $892 a month. You need not be a rocket scientist, you need not emanate from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, to understand that there is a significant shortcoming.

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A first Canadian right here in Ontario, right now in 1997, while the government pats itself on the back and says, "Yes, we're doing very well; this is a recovery of unprecedented proportions," Father Hartley, the spiritual leader of the community, does not think so, not at all. Father Hartley was getting $900 a month in pension, but he gets $262.39 per month from the Anglican Church of Canada, so the government has cut his pension by $262.39. Father Hartley, 72 years of age, a first Canadian, must try to survive in a very difficult, challenging and harsh environment on a little more than $10,000.

Do you know that if you make $247,000 a year, the Mike Harris tax cut will put $15,000 more in your pocket? Two citizens: one in downtown Toronto, a chief executive officer or a vice-president of a company, a person earning $247,000, on taxes will save $15,000; at the other end of the province, Father Hartley, 72 years of age, $10,000 annual income.

Ask yourself, is this justified? Does it make any sense to you? They both only need one set of clothes at a time, they both can only digest one meal at a time, and yet you have the disparity where the people who have an opportunity to run the fastest, to make more and more money, are galloping away from the middle class and are leaving the poor and the destitute, the marginalized, so far behind.

Is this the kind of society that Mike Harris will tolerate? If it were any other government, I would think not. We have a responsibility to give people all opportunities, all latitude in our market environment to progress, to prosper. It should be encouraged relatively without limitation. But we have a more important responsibility, that of giving everyone a chance to dream. We don't have this in our society at present.

This government has embarked in a downloading experiment the like of which has never been enacted in our province. The people of Lake Nipigon, the largest geographical riding in the province, with 26% of the overall land mass -- you know where the riding is, Madame. It extends to Hudson Bay, nestled in the Canadian Shield, between the vastness of Lake Superior and the pristine waters of Lake Nipigon, the largest body of water beyond the Great Lakes, so Superior, Nipigon and Hudson Bay. We have the northernmost community in the province of Ontario, that of Fort Severn. We have 400 miles where we have no road. I want to take you on a small journey before we develop the theme and try to respond while we still can, if we're not under a state of siege, to the daily attacks of Mike Harris against the people of Lake Nipigon.

You leave Manitouwadge, where I reside and have been residing as a proud citizen for the past 32 years. We're at the extreme part of the riding, if you wish. Then you drive one way 600 miles to get to Pickle Lake. Once you reach Pickle Lake, this is where the road system ends in the province of Ontario. Then you must, by way of charter, hop on a small plane and go another 400 miles to the bay, to Fort Severn. You know that Fort Severn, the northernmost community on the shores of Hudson Bay, has some beluga whales. It's the only place where there's a tide in Ontario. You know that, Madame. Hudson Bay is the eighth-largest body of water in the world, and yes, we do have polar bears. They don't abound, but there are some sightings.

That's the riding of Lake Nipigon. It costs an arm and a leg to live there. Everything is weighed by the pound. In our special part of Ontario, we're more impacted by what this government has done and more impacted by what it's about to do. Let me share some examples.

Our riding is made up of some 20 reserves, 10 northern reserves and 10 southern reserves. We also have upwards of 25 other small communities. The largest community is only 6,000 people. The reason I say this is that on January 1 we will be asked to pay for OPP services, Ontario Provincial Police. Only two communities in our riding presently pay for the OPP, for police service. Where I reside, in Manitouwadge, we have a complement of OPP officers, but at 2 o'clock in the morning the service, the protection, if you wish, ceases until resumption at 8 o'clock in the morning. We are asked to call the 1-800 number which will connect you to Thunder Bay. Thunder Bay is 400 kilometres away from Manitouwadge.

But so far we're a peaceful lot. We're inland. Yes, we're isolated, quite resourceful. The crime rate in our community, I must say, and we're very proud of it, is insignificant, in fact almost non-existent. More than 50% of the people do not lock their doors. No one I know would lock her or his car. In Manitouwadge we don't do that; there's no need to do it. But we still need police protection, and since we're fewer than 5,000 people we will begin to pay for it, because Mike Harris and the gang have said, "You will all pay." Well, we cannot afford to pay a lot. But Mike Harris and the gang have also said, "You will get a saving of 50% in your taxes for the school" -- I see the page here -- to send our young people to school.

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On the one hand we will begin to save because we're only paying 50%, but on the other hand we will pay big time because we will be responsible for policing, libraries at the municipal level. We will be responsible for social housing. We'll pay now; the municipality will pay. We will be responsible for a range of services for which we are not accustomed to paying. Oh, we pay; we pay dearly. We pay through our taxes. We've had shared arrangements, a partnership between the provincial government and the municipalities. It worked quite well, thank you. But the government has decided to break it, to breach the partnership. "Out the door," they said to municipalities. "You pay now because we must give a 30% provincial tax break," with no limit, no cap. The more you make, the more you take.

The middle class will have to pay for all that. If you work for a small salary, you pay for the rich. It doesn't make a lot of sense to me, but when you're sitting where they're sitting, it makes all the sense to them. We don't court the same circles, I guess. We don't associate with the same people, I know. But those privileged, winner-take-all -- and Mike Harris loves them all. People at the club, at Upper Canada College, I want to wish them well. I don't wish to take anything away from anyone, but they're taking a lot away from everyone except the anyone, that select few, those people who win the lottery, more often than not. This is where we see the injustice.

If you're a school teacher in Lake Nipigon -- many of my good friends are school teachers, those women, those men who put the welfare and the learning of young people ahead of their own year after year. They're anxious today. They don't fully believe Mike Harris's agenda. They certainly don't believe that it will result in good education order.

Those are the frontliners, those are real people teaching real students. They are not in the ministry's office. Those are the people with real names and real faces. They're pleading with the Premier:

"Mike Harris, please, put the brakes on. You are scaring people. You're not providing us with the answers. Some things you mustn't change all at once. You are overestimating the capacity of people to digest, to assimilate, all of your agenda."

But no, all aboard. This agenda is about the trains running on time. They possess an unprecedented zeal. Examples abound. They have the determination and the zeal of some of the sects, some of the cults that one reads about now and then. This is a revolution, nothing short of that. They're very much aware of it. They know that revolutionaries hurt people, that during a revolution people will get hurt.

Keep in mind, a 30% tax break equals $5 billion. Keep in mind also that the provincial income tax, the PIT, is one third of provincial revenues and 30% of that one third equals $5 billion. Big-time money. It's not a secret. Things are going better and we should all benefit, but you must find the $5 billion someplace and you must find it quickly. In order to pay for the $5 billion, you must cut someplace else.

The audacity. You see the kind of snake oil that those conjurers of illusions, the kind of opiate they display. They say: "We're going to break even. This is a wash. This is revenue-neutral." If you ask them, "Does it mean that my property taxes in Marathon, in Schreiber, in Geraldton, Nakina, Nipigon will go up?" they say, "It's revenue-neutral."

Answer the question. "Will my property taxes go up?" You know they will go up, but they can't tell you, because it might go down someplace else. If I live in Nipigon, all that matters, really, is that my taxes are going up. They said, "Your taxes won't go up." I said, "What about assessment?" "Oh, well, your property will be reassessed."

The bottom line is, am I forking over at the end of the month the same money, more money or less money? Get it? It's not that complex. We'll do it again.

I get my property tax bill, municipal taxes. So far, so good. I see the Premier is acquiescing. With respect, Premier, can you guarantee that the people -- yes, you can look at me, sir. Can you guarantee, Premier, that the people in Nipigon, anyone in our riding, will not pay more taxes? No, you can't. You can shuffle papers all you want and pretend that you're not listening, but you are the one telling people that the taxes will not go up, Premier. Yet we know, when we add all the services that are coming on stream on January 1, three months and a week from now, that we're going to pay big time.

The few dollars that we save on school taxes, where is it going to come from? Do they have a fund, do they have a contingency? How much will it cost? We can't get the figures. The mayors, the reeves, the council people are up in arms. They don't know and they don't believe that the government cares a great deal because the government is on the hook to transfer $5 billion. That's $5,000 million. You know, some of them are millionaires. Imagine if you were 5,000 times -- that's a lot of money. They've got to find the money. There's no secret here, because they've got to pay.

The government keeps on saying: "We will balance the books. This is what we do best. We balance the books. We're fiscally responsible."

The way these people are going, they'll have all of us in the poorhouse. The debt keeps going up. Does it make sense to you? You have a credit card and you're a little overextended. In fact, you're big-time overextended, so you throw in another party. You ask them to raise the limit. That's what they're doing. Why don't they take the $5 billion and put it against the debt? Any good accountant, any economist will tell you, "Pay your debt first." You've mortgaged the province. Reduce the mortgage. Don't take a 30% tax cut and give it to the people we read about, you know, with those long, long cars -- I don't know the brand name, but they're very expensive cars -- stockbrokers, people who deal in stocks and so on. No, you pay the debt. You just take the money and pay the debt because it makes a lot more sense.

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Then you have Ontario Hydro, the society of high priests if there ever was one. They owe $29 billion. Oh, there's another $2.7 billion or $2.8 billion they've borrowed from our Canada pension plan, and pretty soon they will need another $10 billion, all supported by the taxpayers of Ontario.

I say to you, sir, this is no way to run a boutique. You don't run a shop in this fashion. You're inviting bankruptcy. But there they are in their best doublebreasted pinstripe, conveying, with arrogance indeed, that yes, this is sound; the economy is well managed. They are the last people to whom I would trust the few dollars that I have available, because for sure I can guarantee you I would lose that, because they're mismanagers. It's about time that someone takes them to task, because their ideology is a treadmill to failure.

Five billion dollars. The economy is starting to pick up. It's visible. You take the $5 billion and you pay your debt, and then you talk about tax cuts. It makes a lot more sense than the other way around.

The Deputy Speaker (Mr Gilles E. Morin): Questions or comments?

Mr Jim Brown (Scarborough West): No, debate.

The Deputy Speaker: Further debate?

Mr Jim Brown: I'd like to split my time with the member for Kitchener and the member for Northumberland.

The Deputy Speaker: Could you hold on for a minute? Just hold on for a minute. Something happened when I wasn't here. I just want to be informed.

Mr Jim Brown: Will you stop the clock?

The Deputy Speaker: Is there unanimous consent that the honourable member has the floor? There is unanimous consent.

Mr Jim Brown: Can we have unanimous consent to restore the clock to 20 minutes?

The Deputy Speaker: Give or take 30 seconds, I think it's okay.

Mr Jim Brown: My colleague the member for Lake Nipigon tends to plead a little bit of poverty, but I think the first 100 numbers on his speed dial are stockbrokers. Of anybody in the House, my colleague would probably be the one who enjoys the tax cut the most.

In any case, I'm delighted to speak today, to remind this House that our management of the affairs of this great province is producing results.

The Deputy Speaker: I'm sorry to interrupt you again. Stop the clock. You need unanimous consent to ask somebody else to split the time with you. Agreed? Agreed. We'll give you another 20 seconds.

Interjection: You're going to have more than you started out with.

Mr Jim Brown: Up to half an hour.

I'm delighted to speak today to reiterate and remind the House that our management of the affairs of this great province is producing results. We promised jobs. We promised a better economy like Ontario used to be. We're only two years into our mandate and we're doing what we said we'd do. Since June 1995 when we took office, net new jobs have increased by 224,000; consumer confidence is up 18.2%; business confidence for that same period is up 16.8%; business investment is up 12.8%. In the last eight months, housing starts are up 33.1%, and over the first six months of 1997, exports are up 6%. Since June 1995, 220,000 people have come off welfare. The deficit of $11.3 billion has been reduced to $6.6 billion. We're on target to a balanced budget by the year 2000-01.

Because Ontario is prospering and because Ontario comprises 40% of Canada's economy, interest rates are down to 4.75% prime, allowing people to borrow, to spend, and allowing business to borrow, start up, expand and hire people. In spite of all this, taxes have been cut by 22.4%. We're well on target for our 30% tax cut. Yet in spite of all this, tax revenues have still gone up.

In my Scarborough riding, development is skyrocketing, neglected for 32 years of NDP representation. There is an economic rebirth focused on the Golden Mile. I remember when Scarborough's Golden Mile was the largest shopping centre and commercial area in Ontario. That was back in the 1950s. It looked like it was a mile long, and it was a golden age of retailing. It acquired the name Golden Mile. But the area went downhill. During the NDP regime, the GM plant closed, the Sears building was demolished, and vacant land dominated the scene. Crime, drugs and unemployment ran rampant.

Now we have hope, promises and prosperity. Today this vacant land at Warden, Pharmacy and both sides of Eglinton East is being redeveloped. Plans have been approved for the development of nearly 1.6 million square feet of retail, commercial and office space. It will be the largest redevelopment in all of Metro Toronto. The 1.6 million square feet of redevelopment will provide thousands of new construction jobs and thousands of permanent jobs. I'm speaking of thousands of jobs in my riding of Scarborough West, $300 million of capital investment.

The people in my riding don't want handouts; they want an opportunity. They don't want to be dependent. They're people who just want a chance, a chance of getting a job, nice, decent people who want to look after their families. They want to look after their parents, their kids, seniors.

I believe Scarborough is on the brink of a tremendous change for the better. We're returning to the days when a young person could show up in a suit at an office or with workboots at a factory or construction site and start work the same day. Isn't it nice to hear the words, "I've got a job."

My 16-year-old daughter just got her first job, by herself, without my help. She was so proud. She's learning a new set of life skills. It's a part-time job and it's a wonderful teacher. She got the job up the street in Scarborough.

To give you an idea of Scarborough's turnaround, there were $200 million in building permits issued in 1992 in the middle of the NDP regime. In 1997, there will be at least $450 million in permits issued. At Warden and Eglinton, the Golden Mile, there is vacant land from demolished buildings, and that's where the massive redevelopment is occurring. The first phase of a new Canadian Tire store has been approved, with a size of 100,000 square feet.

Interjections.

The Deputy Speaker: The member for Nepean. The member for Windsor-Walkerville.

Mr Jim Brown: Knob Hill Farms on the north side of Eglinton has applied for retail rezoning. That's tens of thousands of square feet. The first phase of redevelopment on the Sears warehouse building on Warden is 200,000 square feet, and there will be a large retail establishment employing hundreds. The second phase will double that size. The Volkswagen building at Eglinton and Warden is the new home of the community care access centre. In addition to that, planned around it, is an additional 340,000 square feet of new stores and commercial places. This area is the largest development project in Toronto. Total construction costs will exceed $150 million. There will be 3,000 man-years of construction work created and thousands of full-time and part-time jobs.

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There is more good news, lots of good news in my riding. Eli Lilly pharmaceuticals has just completed a $60-million research and development centre and hired dozens of PhDs and scientists at its Birchmount and Danforth location. Canadian Thermos has undergone an expansion in hiring. They make lunch boxes, the ultimate test of, "Are there more jobs?" People need lunch boxes, and their sales are booming.

Brenda Librecz, the executive director of economic development for Scarborough, has informed me that Scarborough is such a boom that she can't find an industrial building for rent over 50,000 square feet. She further stated that in 1992 there was a 17% vacancy rate in industrial buildings, and now it's only 6% and it's tougher to find industrial space to lease.

Right now Scarborough has 85% of the available green space in Metro Toronto. Green space is space suitable to build on. Developers want the space for job-creating industries, but home builders want it for residential. They're bidding for land that nobody wanted three years ago.

The Eglinton Square mall is undergoing a massive renovation. The mall is getting an exterior facelift and the interior is being reconfigured: 300,000 square feet of retail space is involved and spending is at least $25 million.

We're building a new firehall, replacing the original Scarborough firehall number one. We've spent money on Scarborough Arena Gardens and the retrofit makes it look like a brand new arena. The Birchmount pool is a great addition to the Birchmount community centre. The pool celebrated its first anniversary this past summer.

The Sisters of St Joseph operate Providence Centre. I call Providence Centre the compassion centre of the universe. Providence has a $40-million expansion plan that will allow them to further help seniors, Alzheimers and the disabled. The Sisters are also building second-storey, single-family homes on the south side of St Clair opposite Providence Centre. This $20-million construction program will provide lots of jobs. On the north side, the Sisters plan to build more single-family units and seniors' apartments. More investment.

Economic growth, vision and the future have replaced the depression. My old school, W.A. Porter, has become a high-tech school with fibre optic linkages and a vast array of computers and software. The private sector donated the computer hardware and high-tech facilities, which make Porter one of the best high-technology schools in North America.

Near the northern border of my riding, a $60-million, first-phase retail centre is being built at Kennedy and 401. There are 500 construction jobs and more permanent jobs that are going to come on line.

At Birchmount and Ellesmere, the old Honeywell site that sat vacant for years will now have 1,000 homes on its 30-acre site. This means more construction jobs and more consumers for the planned retail expansion.

We promised to turn the economy around. We promised to cut taxes. We promised to eliminate the deficit. We promised jobs, jobs and more jobs. In Scarborough West, we're delivering. We're delivering jobs and more jobs.

We are back building Ontario. We are building Ontario the way it used to be, only better. The Golden Mile of the 1950s is coming back with a vengeance. It's coming back bigger, better, stronger and grander.

I can remember three years ago when power of sale signs were all over my riding. Empty stores and factories were interspersed with buildings being torn down, graffiti and refuse, and that's been replaced by positive economic activity and jobs. The new Golden Mile project will rejuvenate Scarborough and produce thousands of jobs. I think we've only just begun.

Mr Wayne Wettlaufer (Kitchener): I was very amused when I was listening this afternoon to the speeches from the two new members, as well as a question from the Leader of the Opposition, Mr McGuinty. I hear daily and in reading Hansard I refer to different individual speeches in debate, and I see that the opposition members commonly lead off their debate or their questions with, "This government is moving too fast," or "This government is moving too far, too fast" or "with reckless abandon," or that "this government doesn't care." Nothing could be further from the truth. We do care. We care very, very deeply for the generation that is coming along. If we are moving too fast, maybe the opposition members would like to explain how they planned to eliminate the deficit, to balance the budget in four years compared to our government doing it in five years.

There is something else that the members of the opposition party never explained. They never explained that they were going to keep health care spending at $17 billion a year. I have sat on finance and estimates committees now for two and a half years, and I have asked continually in those committees how the opposition party, if it had formed the government, would have maintained health care spending at $17 billion. They never explain that to us. They never explain that we are spending $17.8 billion a year on program spending alone and they would have kept it at $17 billion, and they never explain how they would have done it. They say we're closing hospitals. What would they have done?

Let's talk about health care spending. We know that some of the things we've done are painful; short-term, they have to be. However, we have done some reinvestment. For instance, we have established a rural and northern health care framework which ensures 24-hour access to emergency services, a $70-per-hour sessional fee for physicians who cover emergency rooms in rural and northern Ontario, $14 million for growth funding in northern hospitals, $6.7 million for northern community contracts for physicians, $4.4 million to equip ambulances with defibrillators and symptom relief for patients, and an additional $45.5 million to recruit physicians to underserviced areas.

The Ontario drug benefit program has been significantly improved recently. We have added 465 new drugs to the drug formulary. The Ontario drug benefit program now covers over 2,700 quality-assured prescription drug products for those over 65 years of age. The Trillium drug plan has been expanded to include 140,000 low-wage earners who were previously excluded from the plan -- excluded by the former government, a government that claimed to care so much about the poor.

The Minister of Health and the Honourable Cam Jackson, the minister responsible for seniors, have both worked hard and have established a $100-million reinvestment in long-term care facilities, which will have the side-effect, by the way, of creating 2,250 jobs, with 1,750 in the nursing and personal care fields.

We have also expanded our in-home nursing care program; 80,000 seniors and disabled will be able to continue to live in their homes. I recently had a seniors seminar, and that is the one thing that the seniors said, loud and clear. They don't want to spend time in health care facilities; they want to spend their time in their homes.

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The minister has increased spending in other major areas. We've expanded cardiac care to reduce waiting time. Some 325,000 women will have access to breast cancer screening. A cancer care agency has been established to coordinate cancer treatment throughout the province. Additional investments have been made in areas such as transplantation and the neurosciences. The number of kidney dialysis machines has been increased. Immunization programs for seniors and school children have been expanded. With our new healthy babies program, healthy children will receive annual funding of $10 million.

We have made all kinds of good changes to health care. That was necessary, but we couldn't just increase spending. The Liberal Party knew that, because during the campaign they said they were going to keep health care spending at $17 billion, and in spite of repeated questioning, they haven't explained how.

I want to emphasize that the Liberals never, ever admit that they would have had to take some tough measures to balance the budget in four years. They say, "Oh, we wouldn't have reduced taxes." All right, let's look at what has happened in Japan just recently. There have been three factors which have contributed to a sharp fall in GDP in Japan. One of the three factors was an increase in personal taxes. Isn't that amazing? In Japan they increased taxes and they saw a reduction in personal consumption.

We're not surprised at that. When we came into power, we decided that one of the key things we had to do was to reduce personal income taxes in order to increase consumption. We did so, and what has happened? We see retail sales up in every category: automobiles, housing, retail sales in large consumer items and in small consumer items. The housing market has rebounded from a period of stagnation to a period of boom. Not too long ago, in the last couple of weeks, I was talking to a contractor in my Kitchener riding who told me that this boom we are now going through is the biggest boom in 40 years, outside of the one in the 1980s. Well, that's not too bad.

Why is that happening? It's happening because there has been a tremendous increase in jobs. The member for Scarborough West, my colleague, just said a few moments ago that we have had an increase of over 225,000 jobs. That is a net increase of 225,000 jobs. That is good news, but of course the opposition parties never want to focus on that. They want to focus on those small items that don't mean too much.

We know that one of the areas in which we have to do better -- and of course this is also recognized by the federal government -- is youth unemployment. That will follow along. We are interested in the youth. We are interested in the young generation. It used to be called generation X, the lost generation. That is one of the reasons we are revamping the education system. One of the areas of education that must be addressed is technical training.

The Deputy Speaker: Questions or comments?

Mr Dwight Duncan (Windsor-Walkerville): I always enjoy listening to my colleague from Scarborough and by colleague from Kitchener, who present thoughtfully the government's position on a range of issues and a range of current topics, and we are dealing with supply today. Let me say to the members of the government that there is no question that the North American, the Canadian, indeed the western industrial economies have been expanding. We have been expanding in a non-inflationary environment and there is no question that those expansions have benefited average people.

Where we draw the line, where we say that we disagree with you, is on what is the cause and what is the effect. Government members would have you believe that the tax cut is responsible for the growth in demand, the growth in consumption for a variety of products, which have in turn increased employment.

We say that's nuts. We say you're wrong. We say you should have focused on deficit reduction, taken the $5 billion in tax cuts. You know what? You could balance the budget next year. You could be in a balanced budget next year. What does that mean? That means that one of the largest borrowers in this country, one of the largest non-state borrowers in the world, would be out of the debt market. What does that mean? That means reduced demand for money. What does that mean? It means lower interest rates, still lower interest rates.

Interjection: Economics 101.

Mr Duncan: That's Economics 101, exactly right.

Let's talk about tax cuts. Let's get to a balanced budget, and let's deal with meaningful tax cuts. Let's look at property taxes. You have raised them in every community in this province. Let's look at our hospitals. Maybe instead of $5 billion in income tax cuts we could have invested $1 billion or $2 billion into meaningful health care reform. Your plan hasn't worked. A year and a half from now you'll find out it hasn't worked and we'll restore a sense of prosperity and dignity to our provincial economy.

Mr Cullen: Dealing with the comments that have been raised about the income tax cut is very germane because we are dealing with a motion of interim supply and it is dealing with the expenditure of taxpayers' dollars. One has to simply remind the government of the most previous Ontario-wide election, which happened this past June. This past June we had two parties that presented to the people in Ontario the exact, same policy this government has put forward, and that is an income tax cut. What did the people in Ontario do? They very wisely said no. To the parties that ran they expressed their views through their ballot and they chose a government that promised to reinvest the fiscal dividend into providing services and reducing debt.

If this government across the way would do the same thing, then I could tell you --

Mr John R. Baird (Nepean): Come on.

The Deputy Speaker: Member for Nepean.

Mr Cullen: At the door I found people saying: "Why don't they put their fiscal house in order and make sure we have adequate health care, adequate schools, adequate education? With the money we have, these are the priorities we have. Don't give me back the $16 or $20. I'll just" -- I'll try to find a polite word for it. It would just evaporate.

In other words, there is a message to be made here: Put your fiscal house in order, then think in terms of income tax cuts, but don't do that beforehand, because the people in Ontario are not silly. They can see through all these cuts, all this downloading. They do not accept closing hospitals, closing schools, paying more in property tax and paying more in user fees to accommodate an income tax cut they don't want. June 25, when they had the federal election here, across Canada and in Ontario the message was very explicit: "Don't cut income taxes."

The Deputy Speaker: Further questions or comments? Further debate?

Mr Bisson: I have to acknowledge it took a little bit of --

Mrs Margaret Marland (Mississauga South): Is this your maiden speech?

Mr Bisson: It's not my maiden speech and it won't be my last one. Let me guarantee you that.

Interjections.

Mr Bisson: "Aw," they said. That's so touching.

I want first of all to thank the government members for cooperating with us today to make sure we all have equal access to being able to respond to this interim supply motion. Normally there might be a number of questions and comments, but we tried to split up the time so that all parties get the same amount of time to respond to this particular motion.

When it comes to interim supply, the government is basically asking for, by way of this motion, the money to be able to pay the bills of Ontario for the next three months, I believe it is. Is it three or six months? Three; yes. If we were not to pass this motion, the government in effect would not be able to pay the bill. I can tell you, as a member of a former government, that we passed regular motions like this, as they are the regular business this House does. It's the process under our British parliamentary system that makes sure there is some public accountability when it comes to when and how governments are able to spend their money.

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What is particularly the point right now is that this government is undertaking a lot of initiatives that I guess we could say a lot of people in this province are having a certain amount of difficulty agreeing with or even comprehending. We know that the Mike Harris government was elected on the basis of what they call the Common Sense Revolution. People were clear that when this government got elected they were going to do a number of things; they were going to slash spending, they were going to balance the budget, and they were going to do a whole bunch of things to get there, but people really didn't know what those things were. As this government moves forward in the time it has here in the Legislature, we're starting to find out more and more exactly how the government is going about trying to balance the budget over a period of four or five years.

The first thing I want to say is that I believe that at the end of this government's term they will not have balanced the budget. I want to put that on the record. I believe, because of what I see in the numbers and because of the approach the government is taking, that they're making it appear that they're going to be able to meet their fiscal targets, but I think in the longer run they are going to have extreme difficulty in getting there. If the economy were to turn in the opposite direction from where it has been going since 1993 -- since 1993 there has been an upturn not only in the Ontario economy but the Canadian and American economies -- this government will go to the polls with a huge deficit which they're going to have a hard time explaining to the people of Ontario.

Let me explain where I'm coming from. This goes against the holy of holies, because I think most people in Ontario believe this government is going to be able to meet its target. I'm not talking about people who understand the numbers, I'm not talking about the people at finance or the people in banking or in the business community or the union community; I'm talking about the average person at home. Because of the rhetoric they listen to from this government, they say, "Oh, yes, they're going to balance the budget," but I really don't think they're going to get there.

Let me tell you why. Many of the decisions this government is taking when it comes to saving dollars I believe have very little to do with saving dollars. I think a lot of the policies and initiatives this government is undertaking have more to do with how you reshape government to make it fit more closely the government's ideology. That ideology, quite simply, is that government is bad, that we should get rid of government because that would be a good thing, and that public services to a large degree should be paid for by individuals on an on-need basis, in other words, having user fees or going to the private sector to get your services.

This government can talk a good line that it's protecting health care, protecting education and some of those key programs that we rely on in this province, but I believe very deeply that in reality the change this government is undertaking in the end is going to undermine the whole principle those systems have been based on; that is, that they are public programs paid for by the taxpayers of the province -- that's you and me, Speaker -- and that they be publicly funded and that public policy be driven by the government.

I believe this government, in health care and education, is opening very large doors to the private sector. The government will stand and say: "That's not a bad thing. We think the private sector has a role." Maybe in some very small circumstances they do, but by and large, our health care and education systems should be almost exclusively delivered by the public sector. The moment you open the door and allow the private sector to compete in the area of medicine or education, it is a slippery slope to the lowest common denominator, and that will be in the long run, once fully implemented, that those who have the bucks will get those services and those who don't have the bucks will get something less. What you'll end up with in education and health care are two-tier systems. If you've got the dollars, you can go out to the private sector and purchase the Cadillac of services, but if you're like most of us, middle-income Canadians, people who work for a living and make $40,000, $50,000, $60,000 a year, it's going to be very much more difficult.

I think we're seeing signs of this today. I know, as most members of the assembly know, because sometimes they're in the same circumstance, that families in Ontario -- and not only under the term of this government -- as do families across the country, have been finding it more and more difficult to make ends meet. Over the past years it has become almost a necessity that both the man and the wife work at full-time jobs to be able to try to live in our society and have the extra dollars to go out and get a half-decent lifestyle for their family.

That in itself is not bad, but the troubling part is it's becoming more and more expensive and more and more difficult for them to keep up with the Joneses. It's becoming more difficult to be able to say: "I want to buy my own house. I want to buy a car. We would like to take a holiday once every 10 years. We would like to buy new clothes for our kids. We would like to one day pay for an education for our children."

All of those things are becoming more and more difficult, and one of the reasons that is so is partly that there has been a large amount of unemployment that I say has been directly created in our economy in order to create a downward pressure on inflation. Large corporations and others don't like having no surplus labour in the marketplace, because that drives inflation. If there are few workers out there competing for jobs and there's very low unemployment, it means workers can go to their employers and demand a higher wage and thus increase the pressure on inflation.

I believe that governments, especially the multinational sector of companies -- I'm not talking mom and pop's corner store -- have put a huge amount of pressure in order to be able to downsize and create unemployment, so there are a lot of people unemployed. If you have a lot of people unemployed, it creates unemployment, which in turn takes away the demand on wage increases, which reduces inflation. I believe that's by design.

The other thing I want to say on that is that this government by its policies is helping to make that happen and helping to make the kinds of changes that will support that kind of economy, an economy where if you've got dollars, you'll do very well, and if you don't have dollars, you don't do very well.

Let's just look, for example, at the health care sector, what's happened over the past months to a year. The Minister of Health almost weekly stands in this House in answer to questions and says, "We have not cut a single cent out of health care." The Minister of Health and the Premier say they haven't cut a cent out of health care and there's been no reduction in services anywhere else across the province.

Interjection: That's not true.

Mr Bisson: Exactly. This is not true. We are seeing hospitals, not beds, close down across this province, we are seeing hospital programs gutted, we are seeing health units and district health councils lose funding at increasingly alarming rates, and we're seeing the individual programs supported by all of those organizations go by the wayside.

Let's take a look at what's happening in northeastern Ontario. It used to be in the good old days, a couple of years ago, quite frankly, up until about 1995, that if you needed bypass surgery in northeastern Ontario, depending on your severity -- because it was a weighted waiting list; the more severe your condition, the quicker you got in -- for the average person who had a blockage of somewhere around 85% to 90%, they would be able to get into Sudbury Memorial Hospital through the cardiac care system at probably a waiting list of around 30 to 60 days. There were extreme cases where it went longer because there has always been an upwards and downwards need for cardiac care and at times it might have gone as long as three months. But under previous Conservative governments, under previous Liberal and NDP governments, the government of the day made sure the cardiac care system was properly funded so that people did not have to wait longer than they should.

I can tell you that in my constituency office -- and I'm not making this stuff up -- I have, more and more so every day, people coming in requesting my assistance to get them cardiac surgery. They're having to wait upwards of nine and 10 months to get in for cardiac bypass surgery in the event that they're blocked at 85% to 90%. And this government stands and says there's nothing wrong: "We haven't cut health care; there's no problem."

The same could be said about a number of other services delivered in the health care sector. We're seeing, for example, in our communities across northern Ontario -- now, the government announced a few months ago that they were going to cut the provincial funding to the northern regional genetics program. Because myself and the health units and others worked together to raise the profile of this issue, the government figured, "Small potatoes in the big scheme of things," and they saved that particular program, probably about $500,000.

But in the case of other programs, like the speech pathology program for under-six-year-olds in northern Ontario for healthy kids, there no longer is going to be any public funding come January 1, 1998, depending if we can take the minister's word today when she said she would talk to the Minister of Health and put that funding in place and make sure it stays in place. What it means for us in the north is that if you're the parent of a child who needs speech pathology services and that child is under the age of six and is healthy, you will have to pay out of your pocket if the government doesn't come through on the commitment they gave me today.

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The same could be said about the northern dental clinics, where the dental clinic provides services to communities that don't have dental clinics and don't have dentists residing in them. For example, my good friend Len Wood from Cochrane North would know well that Moosonee has no dentist. The only way kids who are of school age can get into a dentist's office is by way of the northern dental program, the clinics that are sponsored by the Porcupine health unit. They travel up there six or seven times a year, they book appointments ahead of time, and the kids living in that community have an opportunity to see a dentist to get their cavities filled, to get their teeth cleaned, as we do, for checkups, or to have an extraction.

Come January 1, 1998, if the government doesn't reverse its position, those kids are going to go without any dental services, because the local market is not such as to be able to support a dentist in that community, and attracting a dentist to Moosonee is very difficult. It's a small community; it's fairly isolated. It's a wonderful place, but it's not the place that's foremost on people's minds to get there.

The point I'm getting at is that government has a responsibility to say, "We will ensure that access to services for Ontarians across this province is somewhat similar." Government puts in place programs to make that happen. But this government is taking those away. What they're doing over the longer term is creating a situation where, more and more so, individuals will have to pay out of their pockets to get the services we used to take for granted.

I know the Conservative members, on being elected to this place -- not all of them, but some of them -- believed that would not be so. They thought the government would be able to trim fat and do all kinds of deep, mystical things when it came to the provincial budget and they would be able to balance it without hurting people. But the reality is, you cannot take $10 billion of spending out of the Ontario budget without people getting hurt and cutting out entire services. That's what this government is doing.

The point I'm making here is that the government says it's going in the right direction and doing all this stuff because it will be better. My argument is that it would be much better if the government really thought about what it needed to do and did the kinds of changes that have to be done to reduce expenditures over the longer period of time, but with the basic understanding that the bottom line is that the taxpayers of Ontario and the citizens of this province have access to services in a somewhat equal way and we can ensure those particular services are in place.

I also listened with some interest a little while ago when the Liberal caucus had their opportunity to debate this motion. They talked about how the government is going in the right direction, but they are going a little bit too fast and too far. I've got to tell you, I disagree with that wholeheartedly. I do not believe this government is going a little bit too far and a little bit too fast; I believe this government and about 80% of what it's doing is going totally in the wrong direction.

The Liberals would have us believe, "Elect us and we'll do the same things as Mike Harris, but we won't go as fast and we won't go as far; we're going to be somehow better." I'm sorry. I have a philosophical difference with the position the Liberal caucus takes. I believe -- and I'll get to the Liberals in a second -- that this government is going in the wrong direction when it comes to health care, when it comes to education, when it comes to the municipal downloading.

The Liberals are trying to make us believe in some way that: "Elect us and we're going to do this kind of stuff. It's kind of good, but we're not going to go too far, too fast." I'm sorry, but it is in the wrong direction entirely. What we need to ask ourselves is, what is the Ontario in the future that we want to --

Mr Cullen: Shoot at the Tories.

Mr Bisson: The Liberal member is saying, "Shoot at the Tories." Shoot at the Tories, yes, but you guys agree with a lot of what the Tories are doing. I know that's not the position of your entire caucus. I know in the Liberal caucus there are some right-wingers and some left-wingers, and sometimes they clash, but the reality is that there are people in your caucus, including your leader, who think this government is going in the right direction. As I listened to Dalton McGuinty's speeches as he ran for the Liberal leadership, there were an awful lot of speeches that you could have plunked into the hands of Mike Harris and had him read, and you wouldn't have known the difference, because on the major issues that the Harris government is moving on, Dalton McGuinty agrees.

Mr Peter L. Preston (Brant-Haldimand): The red book is from their party.

Mr Bisson: Exactly. You could almost have taken the red book --

Mr Preston: The red book was a carbon paper.

Mr Bisson: Exactly. I was a candidate in the last election, as everybody else here was. I remember quite specifically that the Tories ran on the platform of the Common Sense Revolution. The Liberals had a red book that had a whole bunch more promises in it, but the bottom line is that it was the same thing that you guys want to do. When it came to welfare, what did they call it? Mandatory work opportunities was what they called it. It's the same stuff. They wanted to cut welfare recipients' benefits by 21%.

When it came to a host of situations around the Workers' Compensation Board, the Liberals of the day wanted to cut the workers' compensation benefits, wanted to reduce a whole bunch of things that this government is now doing.

I'm saying, voter beware. There are differences of opinion about how we should proceed in this province. I think that's fair. In the end, the people make that determination when they go to the polls.

I see that the Speaker would like to have the floor, so --

The Speaker (Hon Chris Stockwell): The force? I don't know about the force.

Pursuant to standing order 65, I am now required to put the question.

Mr Eves has moved government notice of motion number 38. 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.

DEVELOPMENT CHARGES ACT, 1997 / LOI DE 1997 SUR LES REDEVANCES D'AMÉNAGEMENT

Resuming the adjourned debate on the motion for third reading of Bill 98, An Act to promote job creation and increased municipal accountability while providing for the recovery of development costs related to new growth / Projet de loi 98, Loi visant à promouvoir la création d'emplois et à accroître la responsabilité des municipalités tout en prévoyant le recouvrement des coûts d'aménagement liés à la croissance.

The Speaker (Hon Chris Stockwell): The member for St Catharines had the floor.

Mr James J. Bradley (St Catharines): Yes, you're right. They just called Bill 98, I hear, and I'm quite willing to continue my speech on Bill 98.

As I was saying when I was interrupted, the one thing that will happen is that they will have to build more halls in Ontario, and larger halls -- so there will be a building boom as a result -- to hold all those Conservative fund-raisers, because the people who are most pleased with this particular piece of legislation are the developers who are giving money hand over fist to the Conservative Party. I am told, and my friend from Carleton will confirm this, I'm sure, that the last fund-raiser they held in Ottawa brought in the largest amount of money ever for any fund-raiser in Ottawa.

Interjection.

Mr Bradley: The member for Etobicoke-Humber says it was even higher than that. It's all the people who are good friends of the government: the developers, the people who want to end rent control. That's not the senior citizens I talk to. That's not the people of modest income who are struggling to make ends meet. What we're talking about there, I assure you, are people of modest income, and they don't want to see an end to rent controls.

But this Bill 98 is a package that goes along with the end of rent controls. I think there are a lot of people out there today who still don't know that this government is trying to end rent controls in this province, that the legislation will in fact end rent control. I am concerned that they don't know that and I'm going to help them know that.

To all who are watching today, all those seniors who have said, "We thought Mike Harris had perhaps a good plan for Ontario but we're a bit worried, so tell us more about rent control," I have to say, let me tell you what Mike's doing for you. He's going to make you stay in your present abode, and the way he's going to make you do that is that if you move out, way up goes the rent, and when you go into a new building, you're facing new rent and higher rent. That's most unfortunate, but it fits right into the pattern of this government.

If you are rich, if you are privileged, if you don't have a social conscience, you should vote for Mike Harris and this government. But if you are not, if you are none of those categories, I certainly recommend that you don't vote for Mike Harris, that you look for a more moderate and reasonable and progressive party, such as the Liberal Party.

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The Speaker: Questions or comments?

Mr Gilles Bisson (Cochrane South): I was here the other day, and I listened to the speech by the member for St Catharines but I want to comment on what you said late last week, and that is, this government quite frankly, on this particular bill, is taking a most interesting position. They started off with this bill by saying that no municipality in Ontario should pass any development charges back on to the developer. In other words, if you were a developer and you wanted to go out and build a subdivision project, the municipality would not have the ability to pass on what are called soft services by way of development charges.

Mr Bradley: They probably heard from Hazel.

Mr Bisson: Exactly. I'm getting to this point. We at the time, the NDP caucus and the Liberal caucus, said no, that's wrong. The developer has, to a certain extent, to be responsible for the cost of soft services, because if a developer builds, let's say, 50 or 500 new houses in a subdivision, it's logical to assume that the people living in those houses will use those soft services, such as libraries, recreational centres, day care centres or whatever it might be. To just try to slough that on to all the other taxpayers really is a disservice to the taxpayer and is basically a gift to the developer where the developer ends up pocketing more money.

We put that argument to you last fall and this spring, and the mayors of the communities across Ontario put that to you as well. Hazel McCallion, as the member for St Catharines pointed out, lobbied your government and said: "You can't do that. You can't intrude on municipal government in the way you are when it comes to our ability to determine how we're going to pay for services, especially in light of your download." The government said, "Okay, Hazel, that's fine, we hear you." Now the government is saying, "We're not going to eliminate the ability to do it altogether, but the developer has to pay at least 10%."

Why are we debating this bill? You were wrong in the first place. You should have withdrawn the bill and just left things the way they were. I think, quite frankly, this bill is a waste of --

The Speaker: Thank you. Questions or comments?

Mr Steve Gilchrist (Scarborough East): I am pleased to respond to the member for St Catharines, the one and only voice for the Liberal Party in this chamber. It's always a pleasure to hear from Mr Bradley, and on the assumption he speaks for his party, we're more than happy to comment.

Let's get back to the nub of what this bill is all about. This bill is about ensuring that when a developer wants to create new housing or a new office building or school, the improvement in that community, any costs of the hard services, are borne by that new user. What is not appropriate, though, would be the creation of an art gallery, an ice skating rink or a new city hall, suggesting that the occupants of the new development should be the sole contributors to the funding of that other common community facility. Therefore, this bill makes sure that the municipality still has a 10% role in funding those other common elements such as an art gallery.

The bottom line is nobody disagrees with the thought that if there is an increase in costs to the community because the sewer line has to be extended, the road extended, the sidewalks, those costs should be borne by the developer, but for all those other things, it is totally inappropriate to put them on the backs of the people who are trying to create investments, trying to create jobs for the construction industry, trying to help us rebuild the great province of Ontario.

The member opposite also typified this bill and suggested that the government wasn't listening and somehow the process was flawed. I suggest to him exactly the opposite. We listened to the various stakeholders, including the municipalities and the development industry. As a result of that, we brought forward a myriad of amendments to the bill, and the bill that's now before us represents an amalgam of all those ideas, walking the best path we can down the middle, and this bill genuinely will serve its goal of greater investment.

Mr Michael A. Brown (Algoma-Manitoulin): I want to commend the member for St Catharines on his thoughtful and sensible approach to this bill. I want to say, though, with regard to development charges, this is just one more attack on local government. Local government used to be able to make those decisions about what was appropriate for a developer to pay and what might not be appropriate in their own community. It didn't need Big Brother to make those decisions. This is another example of the Harris Tories in the face of people of Ontario, in the face of local government.

I represent a constituency in northern Ontario that would love to be able to impose development charges. You would need development to do that. In our part of the world this is not a big issue; we wish it were. But this particular bill is symptomatic of the bullying and the harassment of local councils, local mayors, local reeves, where you tell them how things are going to be.

I was in Killarney on Saturday, and they're concerned that you're going to close the local school. St Joe's may be closed. There's a good group of people -- the acronym is KEEP -- who are trying to get together an environmental and ecological study group of the outdoors, and this school, almost adjacent to Killarney Provincial Park, would make it work.

I don't think the people of Killarney are terribly interested in development charges, but they are interested in the downloading of services that's happening in that community. In the little town of Killarney they pay $80,000 to the separate school board in Sudbury -- $80,000. Part of that they won't have to pay any more under the government's downloading. Do you know what they are going to have to pay in Killarney for police services alone, just for police services? Forget all that other stuff, just for police service: $80,000. So it is a net loss.

On top of that, you're now proposing district boards, a second tier of government, because the local people, according to Mike Harris, don't know what they're doing.

Mr Floyd Laughren (Nickel Belt): I'm trying to follow the government's intentions on development charges. I've tried to follow it right from the beginning, and I appreciate the fact that the member for St Catharines has helped me through this process. May I say as well that when I saw the member for St Catharines walk in the chamber here about 10 minutes ago -- he was doing other work, of course -- I thought: "Thank God. The member for St Catharines is going to get an opportunity to speak today."

Mr Gilchrist: Such a rare occurrence. We were truly blessed.

Mr Laughren: It's a rare occurrence; however, it's a treat when the member for St Catharines speaks. I notice that now that I'm in opposition too. He was no treat when we were in government when he spoke. It means, really, that Mr Bradley from St Catharines has done a flip-flop himself. He used to be really nasty and now he's very good and very effective in criticizing this government, but he wasn't always like that, I want to assure you.

I want to commend the member for St Catharines for his remarkable speech here this afternoon on development charges. I can tell you, the Liberal Party has a reputation for flip-flopping, but -- and I hasten to add but -- I want to know what this government did on development charges. Tell me if I'm wrong. Didn't they start out by saying that development charges would be allowed but not on any soft services? Isn't that what they said?

Ms Marilyn Churley (Riverdale): Yes, that's what they said.

Mr Laughren: Isn't that what they said?

Interjection: We used common sense.

Mr Laughren: No, you didn't use common sense. You used Hazel McCallion intimidation. That's what made you change your mind. You were scared out of your wits of Hazel McCallion. She terrified you, didn't she? She never terrified the member for St Catharines, though. The member for St Catharines knew how to deal with Hazel McCallion, I know that. I'm very pleased that the member for St Catharines made his points.

The Speaker: Response, member for St Catharines.

Mr Bradley: I want to thank all members for their kind contribution. Some I agree with more than others. I think we have to understand that when there is new development taking place, there are cultural services required in a community. There are libraries. There are recreation centres for senior citizens that we wouldn't want to deny them. There are skating rinks. There are soccer fields. There are new pressures for these kinds of services when there's new development taking place. If we could be convinced, for instance, that all the money that would be saved by not charging this development charge went back into the pocket of the purchaser, some people might say that would be acceptable, but we all know it's going back in the pocket of the developer. Some of it will make its way into the Tory coffers, because they're going to have the fund-raisers, but most of it is going to go into the developer's pocket.

I'm glad the member for Algoma-Manitoulin brought up the situation at St Joe's in Killarney. I didn't get a chance in my remarks to do so. I understand the other concerns they have about the police services, for instance, and those costs that are associated with that.

My friend from Nickel Belt was very kind. He and I have certainly been more in sync since we've been in opposition than we were when he was sitting on the other side of the House, and that is certainly natural.

The member for Cochrane South was saying a while ago, inadvertently I'm sure, that he thought the Liberal Party agreed with the Conservatives. What Liberal members have been saying is that even those people who agree with the Conservative Party -- not us, not those in the Liberal Party, but the people out there we talk to -- believe they're moving too quickly, too drastically and not looking at the consequences of their actions. The consequences of these actions will be dire for communities across the province.

The Speaker: It now being 6 of the clock, this House stands adjourned until 6:30 of the clock this evening.

The House adjourned at 1801.

Evening sitting reported in volume B.

September 23, 1997

MEMBERS' STATEMENTS

HÔPITAL MONTFORT

NORTH BAY DAYS OF ACTION

GREATER PETERBOROUGH CHAMBER OF COMMERCE

ASSISTANCE TO FLOOD VICTIMS

EDUCATION FINANCING

ERNIE LAROCQUE

KIDNEY DIALYSIS

ONTARIO HYDRO

OPERATION CLEAN SWEEP

MOTIONS

COMMITTEE SUBSTITUTIONS

GOVERNMENT ADVERTISING

ORAL QUESTIONS

EDUCATION REFORM

VISITOR

EDUCATION FINANCING

PAY EQUITY

SPEECH PATHOLOGY

HOSPITAL RESTRUCTURING

FAMILY RESPONSIBILITY OFFICE

MUNICIPAL ENUMERATION

PUBLIC SERVICE AND LABOUR RELATIONS REFORM

CHARITABLE GAMING

SOCIAL ASSISTANCE

LAKEVIEW NURSING HOME

SPEECH PATHOLOGY

PETITIONS

VIDEO LOTTERY TERMINALS

MUNICIPAL RESTRUCTURING

COURT DECISION

TUITION FEES

AMBULANCE SERVICE

COURT DECISION

TFO

FIRE IN HAMILTON

ROCK MUSIC GROUP

BEAR HUNTING

OCCUPATIONAL HEALTH AND SAFETY

PUBLIC SERVICE AND LABOUR RELATIONS REFORM

TFO

PUBLIC SERVICE AND LABOUR RELATIONS REFORM

COURT DECISION

ORDERS OF THE DAY

INTERIM SUPPLY

DEVELOPMENT CHARGES ACT, 1997 / LOI DE 1997 SUR LES REDEVANCES D'AMÉNAGEMENT