CONTENTS
Wednesday 20 November 1991
Election of Vice-Chair
Simcoe Equipment and Supplies
STANDING COMMITTEE ON THE OMBUDSMAN
Chair: Morrow, Mark (Wentworth East NDP)
Vice-Chair: Haeck, Christel (St. Catharines-Brock NDP)
Curling, Alvin (Scarborough North L)
Fawcett, Joan M. (Northumberland L)
Henderson, D. James (Etobicoke-Humber L)
Kormos, Peter (Welland-Thorold NDP)
Mammoliti, George (Yorkview NDP)
Murdoch, Bill (Grey PC)
Ward, Margery (Don Mills NDP)
Wessenger, Paul (Simcoe Centre NDP)
Wilson, Gary (Kingston and The Islands NDP)
Witmer, Elizabeth (Waterloo North PC)
Substitutions:
Fletcher, Derek (Guelph NDP) for Mr Wessenger
McLean, Allan K. (Simcoe East PC) for Mrs Witmer
Clerk: Carrozza, Franco
Staff: Murray, Paul, Research Officer, Legislative Research Service
The committee met at 1005 in committee room 2.
ELECTION OF VICE-CHAIR
The Chair: The first business on the agenda is the election of a Vice-Chair. Do I have any nominations? Mr Murdoch, do you have a nomination?
Mr B. Murdoch: Yes, I do. I nominate Christel Haeck.
The Chair: Are there any further nominations? Seeing none, I declare the nominations closed. Christel Haeck, do you stand for Vice-Chair?
Ms Haeck: I move to stand, and I thank my nominator.
The Chair: Congratulations, Christel.
Mr McLean: On a point of order, Mr Chairman: I wonder why we need a Vice-Chair when the committee is not meeting. I sent you a letter back in May to appear before the committee and the committee has never met, so what would be the point of having a Vice-Chair when the Chairman is not doing anything?
Mr Mammoliti: We are going to be meeting.
The Chair: Thank you very much for calling my competency into play. I can tell you what has happened since then. We have had a lot of subcommittee meetings. The reason we have not met is that there have been no denied cases in either report by the Ombudsman. At this point, I feel obliged to invite you back next week when the Ombudsman is here. I understand you have some very strong concerns and I think you should address those concerns to her directly.
Mr McLean: I would like the opportunity of five minutes just to fill the committee in on the background of that file. Then you will be more aware of it when the Ombudsman is here next week.
The Chair: By all means, go ahead, as long as you keep it fairly brief, please.
SIMCOE EQUIPMENT AND SUPPLIES
Mr McLean: This file goes back some 10 years. It had to do with Simcoe Equipment and Supplies Ltd, which had a contract with the government. The contractor went broke and the subcontractor never got paid. It was a long process. He finally got some $27,000. About five years ago, he claimed for interest on that. It was all through the Ministry of the Environment. For a long time it went back and forth in committee. This individual, who is almost bankrupt, needed what he thought was due to him.
The Ombudsman at that time, Dr Hill, was supportive of his application, as was the committee. There was to be an adjudicator appointed. Someone was recommended by the individual and someone was recommended by the ministry. I was quite surprised some time ago to see a letter from the new Ombudsman saying the file was closed. I thought it was the duty of the Ombudsman to make sure that people who were having problems with the process were helped out. I was very disturbed and so was the individual to find out that now we have somebody who is not acting on behalf of the little person, so to speak.
I want to raise that with the Ombudsman, but I want the committee to be aware of it because Ed Philip, when he was on the committee before, was very supportive of it, as were all the members of the committee. Michael Zacks, the legal counsel from the Ombudsman's office, was dealing with it and was very supportive of it also. I just wanted to give you some of the background of the file. It is very thick. There are Hansard reports in the file, dating back to about 1985, I think, and the legal counsel you have looking into it, Mr Chairman, will probably be providing you with some of those Hansard reports. Mr Bell was legal counsel for the committee at the time. He was dealing with it on behalf of the Ombudsman committee.
Everybody was supportive of it; the Ombudsman and the committee were. All of a sudden we got a letter saying the file is closed. I do not accept that. I believe the Ombudsman's job is to help those people who need to deal with ministries that try to get out of paying the little guy.
Mr Jack Alexander, the person the money is owed to, is in dire straits and needs this funding. I would just like the opportunity to bring it up with the Ombudsman next week.
The Chair: Thank you very much, Mr McLean. I am really glad you brought this forward. You and I have talked about this. You have sent me a letter about it. You know I have legal counsel looking into it. You also know the Ombudsman is here next week. By all means, please come back and address it at that point.
Mr McLean: Thank you.
The Chair: I think this is the perfect venue for that. That concludes the open session. We will now move into our closed session.
The committee continued in camera at 1010.