Assemblée législative de l'Ontario

The House resumed at 8 o’clock, p.m.

Clerk of the House: The first order, resuming the adjourned debate on the amendment to the amendment to the motion for an address in reply to the Speech of the Honourable the Lieutenant Governor at the opening of the session.

THRONE SPEECH DEBATE

Mr. Speaker: The hon. member for Carleton East.

Mr. P. Taylor (Carleton East): Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. A. J. Roy (Ottawa East): Come on, let’s hear it from the Chairman of the Management Board.

Hon. E. A. Winkler (Chairman, Management Board of Cabinet): Members opposite only have four members here.

Mr. Roy: That’s more than the minister has back there.

Mr. P. Taylor: Mr. Speaker, I rise at this time --

Hon. Mr. Winkler: The opposition has two supporters.

Mr. Roy: The government has three bodies there but --

Mr. Speaker: Order, please. The hon. member for Carleton East has the floor. Will he commence, please?

Mr. P. Taylor: I will if I am allowed to, Mr. Speaker, I appreciate your concern but the Chairman of the Management Board or the government House leader, however he wishes to be known, is obviously having difficulty controlling his side of the House, which means himself -- because there aren’t very many others there and those who --

Hon. Mr. Winkler: Will the member say that again, please?

Mr. Speaker: Order, please; order!

Mr. P. Taylor: It’s okay, the minister will get it in Hansard.

Hon. Mr. Winkler: It’s the member in front of him who is giving the member difficulties.

Mr. P. Taylor: Yes.

Mr. Roy: The Chairman of Management Board should hold himself together.

Hon. Mr. Winkler: I would say the same to the member for Ottawa East.

Mr. P. Taylor: Mr. Speaker, I rise at this time to support the motion moved by my leader, the hon. member for Brant (Mr. R. F. Nixon), and seconded by the deputy leader of our party, the member for York Centre (Mr. Deacon).

Mr. J. H. Jessiman (Fort William): Who are not here!

Mr. P. Taylor: Listen, if my friend wants to get into the business of attendance in the House, we can look at the vacant benches on his side, so I wouldn’t start into that.

Hon. Mr. Winkler: Oh, cut that out.

Mr. P. Taylor: For the last two days in a row in this House, the government has respectively --

Hon. Mr. Winkler: The member couldn’t call a vote if he wanted to, and he only needs five members; so cut that out.

Mr. P. Taylor: -- has had respectively 11 and 12 ministers in the question period. They are making a mockery of that, so I wouldn’t get into that business, my friend.

Hon. Mr. Winkler: The member couldn’t call a vote, he doesn’t have enough people.

Mr. Speaker: Order, please. Will the hon. member continue?

Mr. P. Taylor: Yes, I would like to, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Roy: Will you bring the House leader under control, Mr. Speaker?

Mr. P. Taylor: Mr. Speaker, I felt a certain degree of empathy for Her Excellency, the Lieutenant Governor. It was apparently her first experience reading a Speech from the Throne, and it certainly was my first time hearing one in this House. For her sake I hope it wasn’t too great a disappointment that she had to read as her first Speech from the Throne one of such little substance.

For the people of Ontario it was another indication that the Conservative Party has lost both the will and the ability to provide this province with leadership. This Speech from the Throne was devoid of any programme. In fact, in my opinion, it made a mockery of the tradition of the Speech from the Throne, a tradition which says that such speeches are to indicate to the Legislature -- and, by extension, the people of Ontario -- the programme the government intends to bring forward in the ensuing session.

This speech, in my opinion, heralds a new era of arrogance in which the government of Ontario says to the people, “We believe more in the public relations approach than in telling you what we intend to do for you in the ensuing session.”

An hon. member: Right on.

Mr. P. Taylor: Since that speech on March 11 we’ve learned that the Tory government will bring in a goody or goodies each day up to and including April 7, when we will receive the budget, which of course will be a bushel of goodies designed to win over the electorate.

Mr. Roy: What’s on tap for tomorrow?

Mr. Speaker: Order, please. The hon. member for Carleton East has the floor.

Mr. Roy: The House leader should give us a schedule.

Mr. Speaker: Order.

Mr. P. Taylor: They missed bringing in a goody today because, as I said earlier in response to an interjection from my friend over there, they had less than half the cabinet here today. They only had 11 ministers, which of course is another issue, and which makes a mockery of the question period -- a time when the majority of ministers should be here to respond to questions from the opposition parties.

Hon. Mr. Winkler: Not the kind of questions the member would ask.

Mr. P. Taylor: The tactics I just mentioned a moment ago are well known, but just to give them a little more credence I would quote from the Toronto Star of Monday, March 24, and an article by Charlotte Montgomery. She says in about the fifth paragraph: “The government was expected to follow the Throne Speech with a daily parade of announcements designed to catch sustained publicity as it heads towards an election.” Don’t take my word for it, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Roy: How cynical can the House leader be?

Mr. Jessiman: The member is lucky -- here comes the member for Welland South (Mr. Haggerty).

Mr. P. Taylor: M. l’Orateur, pour quelques instants je veux m’adresser au sujet du bilinguisme dans la province d’Ontario.

This is a government, Mr. Speaker, that professes to believe in official bilingualism. This is a government that consistently fails to allocate its full share of federal bilingualism grants. This is also a government that consistently fails to put bilingual people into jobs in areas of the province where they are badly needed.

M. l’Orateur, je reçois quotidiennement des lettres de mes électeurs et des électeurs dans d’autres comtés dans l’est de l’Ontario indiquant qu’ils sont frustrés d’un jour à l’autre à cause de l’absence de fonctionnaires bilingues.

These are not, by and large, educated people who are complaining of the lack of bilingualism. These are pensioners, people on low and fixed incomes, people of less advantage than you and me. These are the people who are confronting the bureaucracy and the system, largely unilingual, French-language people who have been told that the Ontario government will render its services in bilingual areas of the province bilingually, and it hasn’t done it. There is widespread disappointment in eastern Ontario, where I come from.

However, I want to commend one high official of the provincial bureaucracy who has done something. I speak of the chief electoral officer and the Clerk of this House, and I say that perhaps after hearing my comments in this House last fall about the lack of bilingualism in the polling places of this province, he has taken action. He has ordered that the printed materials in the polling places in Ontario be bilingual. He has done this because he is independent of the rest of the bureaucracy in the Ontario government, but more so because he cares and he responds to a need when he sees it; and I commend him for that.

Mr. Roy: Right on.

Mr. P. Taylor: I am sure a lot of people, a lot of the older members around here, the ones who have been around here a long time, are getting pretty sick and tired of hearing about eastern Ontario and neglect.

Mr. G. Samis (Stormont): Why should they get sick and tired of hearing it? They haven’t heard it from their back-benchers.

Mr. P. Taylor: I am going to get to that. My hon. friend from Stormont --

Hon. Mr. Winkler: It will be from northern Ontario, I know.

Mr. P. Taylor: -- makes that point, and I am going to get to that because --

Mr. Samis: It’s time the government heard from the east.

Mr. P. Taylor: -- if they are getting sick and tired of it, they can be very certain the people of eastern Ontario are sick and tired of it. They are saying why is nothing ever done to bring the economy of eastern Ontario even up to a semblance of the economy of the part of the province where this Legislature is situated. The fact that so little has been done in eastern Ontario must have something to do with the representation from that part of the province on the government side of the House.

Mr. Samis: Where are they tonight?

Mr. P. Taylor: I mean, what else? They obviously haven’t articulated the case and the cabinet obviously hasn’t listened to them.

Interjections by hon. members.

Hon. Mr. Winkler: I think they better get ready over there. They are getting another member, it seems to me. He is coming across there.

Interjections by hon. members.

Mr. Speaker: Order, please. The hon. member for Carleton East has the floor.

Mr. P. Taylor: If the government House leader can just contain himself; and if my friend over here could just get me a glass of water, I would be very happy. Thanks very much.

Mr. Speaker, let me give you two examples of what I am talking about. This government belatedly ordered the construction of Highway 417, many years after it was needed in the first instance.

Mr. R. Haggerty (Welland South): It was 15 years too late.

Mr. P. Taylor: This government ordered the construction of that highway -- I am not certain just how many years ago, but it sure took a long time to build -- and it isn’t, even yet, fully connected to the city of Ottawa. We are fighting through the mud on that one.

Mr. Haggerty: In the fullness of time.

Mr. P. Taylor: In the fullness of time, it will be connected to Ottawa. This government, knowing of the need for Highway 417, took all those years to make that decision. Then once the decision was implemented and the highway was under construction, it knew full well the impact that highway would have on the economy of the Highway 17 area, the scenic route.

Once the people of the Highway 17 area became exercised over their plight as a result of the impending existence of Highway 417, the Minister of Industry and Tourism (Mr. Bennett) said this Ontario government will make sure the Highway 17 area is promoted and assisted as a tourism region. That was fine and dandy as far as it went. Subsequently, we find out that various property owners and tourism developers along the Highway 17 route have made applications to agencies like the Eastern Ontario Development Corp., after making substantial investments in their own areas. They are being told -- now get this -- by agencies like the EODC that the Highway 17 area is not a viable tourist region.

Mr. Haggerty: Shame, shame.

Mr. P. Taylor: Let’s make up our minds, fellows. The minister says it is going to be promoted as a tourist region by this government and there are going to be economic incentives to produce job-creating projects and to entice tourists off 417 and back on to 17 as the scenic route. And the agencies of this government are contradicting that by declaring the region not viable for tourism, and thereby not coming up with the kinds of loans and grants the businessmen need to turn it into a decent tourist region.

Mr. Roy: Shame.

Mr. P. Taylor: Let’s look at the other example in eastern Ontario, the purchase of 100,000 acres near Prescott in Edwardsburgh township.

Mr. Roy: That was a farce.

Mr. P. Taylor: Now we all know the sad story of how the eastern Ontario ministers, all three of them, were not consulted in this acquisition, and in fact got themselves into an incredibly embarrassing situation by criticizing the purchase as they were being made, unbeknownst to them, by the government.

Mr. Samis: So they say.

Mr. P. Taylor: Here we have, in one fell swoop, the former Treasurer (Mr. White) ordering the acquisition of 10,000 acres of land in an area of the province where existing industrial park lands and existing urbanized area need industrial incentives. They need help to bring --

Mr. Samis: That’s what we have been saying.

Mr. P. Taylor: -- industry into their areas. I think of Cornwall and I think of Kingston --

Mr. P. J. Yakabuski (Renfrew South): We’ve got an agreement on that. What is the member talking about?

Mr. P. Taylor: -- and Brockville and so on. I know it is hard for the member for Renfrew South to understand. He doesn’t know anything about eastern Ontario. Don’t interrupt me.

Hon. Mr. Winkler: Is the member saying that the other member knows nothing about eastern Ontario?

Mr. P. Taylor: No, he doesn’t. He doesn’t know anything about it.

Hon. Mr. Winkler: Come around. Both members should grow up.

Mr. P. Taylor: If that member knew anything about -- he doesn’t know anything.

Interjections by hon. members.

Mr. Speaker: Order, please. Order.

Mr. Roy: That member doesn’t know anything about anything.

Mr. P. Taylor: If the member who is interjecting --

Hon. Mr. Winkler: Schoolboy Roy was no trouble.

Mr. Speaker: Order, please. The member for Carleton East has the floor and I would ask him to continue.

Mr. P. Taylor: Is that the member for Renfrew South? Is that who it is?

Mr. Samis: Rep by pop.

Mr. P. Taylor: Rep by pop, right. There’s the man who’s interjecting, the member for Renfrew South.

Hon. Mr. Winkler: And don’t forget to say baby.

Mr. P. Taylor: Okay, Eric baby! Right on.

I don’t know how long the member for Renfrew South has been in this House, but he’s been in this House for an awfully long time.

Hon. Mr. Winkler: That makes me feel much better.

Mr. P. Taylor: He is one of the members who has failed to inject the opinions --

Mr. Speaker: Order, please. The hon. member has a point of order he would like to raise.

Mr. J. F. Foulds (Port Arthur): Mr. Speaker, I wish you would enforce the rules of the House. You know very well that members of the House are not supposed to refer to other members by their names; and Eric baby is even a misnomer.

Hon. Mr. Winkler: Mr. Speaker, I agree with that. Make him withdraw.

Mr. Speaker: The hon. member doesn’t have a point of order. I’ll ask the hon. member for Carleton East to continue.

Mr. P. Taylor: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I really appreciate the point made by my friend from Port Arthur because the member for Ottawa Centre (Mr. Cassidy) never refers to any members in this House by their ridings or by their portfolios, so what’s new?

Mr. Samis: Come, come now.

Mr. P. Taylor: My friend from Renfrew South is being represented --

Mr. Foulds: That’s an argumentum ad hominum if I ever heard one.

Mr. P. Taylor: -- by the government House leader as someone who knows a great deal about eastern Ontario.

Mr. Roy: He knows himself.

Mr. P. Taylor: If he knew half as much as the other members from that part of the province know, this government would be doing something for eastern Ontario.

Mr. F. Laughren (Nickel Belt): They just made him chairman of ONR.

Mr. P. Taylor: The member for Renfrew South obviously hasn’t had the kind of influence and input into cabinet decisions of his government that he should have had as a member representing a distinctly identifiable region of this province.

Hon. Mr. Winkler: I would still rather listen to him than to this member.

Mr. J. E. Bullbrook (Sarnia): Is that member in the cabinet?

Hon. Mr. Winkler: Yes, I am.

Mr. Laughren: Don’t try it.

Mr. P. Taylor: I want to talk about land use planning and housing.

Hon. Mr. Winkler. Is the member against that? Let him say so.

Mr. P. Taylor: This government doesn’t understand those two terms. This government doesn’t understand that we have to talk about housing and land use planning virtually in the Same breath. They are not unrelated. We’ve been promised a plan for Ontario. I don’t want members to take my word for it; I refer to the Globe and Mail, page 8, Sat., March 22, a piece by Robert Williamson. He says as follows:

“Ambitious plans for a future studded with new cities and a provincial growth plan to assemble a clear picture from the jigsaw of local planning initiatives have been put on a back-burner at Queen’s Park. Put it down to three things, a reluctance by the government to turn unnecessary stones in an election year; acceptance of more conservative growth projections; and the return of Darcy McKeough as Treasurer and chief planner. There will be no showing of the promised rudimentary provincial plan before May or June and it will be next year before anything is finalized. It was first mentioned last October when then-Treasurer John White indicated it would be unveiled within a month.”

He goes on to talk about this business about a provincial plan, something we’ve been promised for a long time. He says:

“There have been subtle changes in the government’s attitude to the provincial plan now waiting in Mr. McKeough’s desk drawer until after the April 7 budget. It is now referred to as a strategy rather than a plan. Whatever emphasis the government does finally put on the document, it will go to considerable lengths in this election year to avoid criticism that it is imposing its heavy-handed design on the province from an ivory tower in Toronto. Comments by Premier William Davis at the release of the Throne Speech last week gave some hints of government thinking.”

Mr. Laughren: The blind leading the blind.

Mr. P. Taylor: To continue:

“Mr. Davis sensed a mood in the electorate that people are being over-governed and he said he will respond by bringing in a more restrained legislative programme.”

Mr. Foulds: The member for Timiskaming (Mr. Havrot) shouldn’t buy it.

Mr. P. Taylor: That is very revealing, Mr. Speaker, because this party has been saying for a very long time that this government doesn’t even begin to understand --

Mr. Laughren: Is the member for Timiskaming replacing ONR with Krauss-Maffei?

Mr. P. Taylor: -- the business of centralized bureaucracy influencing local events. It would seem that something is getting through to the Premier but it may be too late.

Mr. Speaker, in recent weeks my leader has asked me to assume the responsibilities as official opposition critic on communications policy and I’m deeply honoured to do that. As a broadcast journalist, film-maker, public relations practitioner and someone with an intimate knowledge of communications hardware, I feel the past dozen years have given me an adequate base from which to do this job.

My first day on the job, the Minister of Transportation and Communications (Mr. Rhodes) made a statement on federal-provincial relations as they pertained to cable television. That statement was just another drop in the bucket of the anti-federal government diatribe that we have been fed for the last few weeks.

An hon. member: Most of it is accurate.

Mr. P. Taylor: My question to him revealed that Ontario does indeed want jurisdiction over cable television. The federal position is clear. The federal minister responsible for communications has told the provinces that if they want to negotiate jurisdiction over cable it is a constitutional matter, and therefore should be discussed at the first ministers’ level. This government refuses to acknowledge that fact and instead chooses to make silly attacks on the federal bureaucracy and the federal government.

My suggestion to the government is: Why not look for an area of agreement on this subject? Why not probe the business that Ottawa has said is open for probing, and that is the sharing of the jurisdiction and the sharing of the administrative control over cable television? I should add, Mr. Speaker, that we in the Liberal caucus are somewhat sympathetic with the minister’s objectives regarding cable television. We just wish he would go about it in a much more constructive manner.

I would like to deal now for a few minutes on the question of the conduct of the business of the House and the conditions I feel that affect my performance as a private member. I hope that some of my colleagues in the House will agree with some of the things I intend to say on this.

I feel at a time when both political institutions and politicians in general are under more scrutiny and attack than in recent history. The level of public cynicism about us and the parliaments we serve is very high. There are more politicians and near politicians in prison today in North America than ever before.

Mr. Foulds: Some of them are even in asylums like this.

Mr. P. Taylor: I believe the public’s understanding of the role of Legislature and of the role of us, as members, is very low. I also believe that we are doing extremely little to help them understand better what this Legislature is trying to do.

Mr. I. Deans (Wentworth): I don’t agree with that.

Mr. P. Taylor: We are doing little, I feel, to make this House more productive and less susceptible to bedlam.

Mr. Deans: Most members do a pretty good job in trying to stand up and speak.

Mr. P. Taylor: And I believe one way to improve the public’s understanding of what we are doing, and certainly another way to render our collective behaviour more constructive, would be to render the debates of this House open to broadcast coverage.

Mr. Foulds: Conflict of interest.

Mr. P. Taylor: And again I don’t speak alone.

An hon. member: We hope not.

Mr. P. Taylor: Canadian Press reported, as reprinted in the Toronto Star, Monday, March 24, 1975:

“House of Commons Speaker James Jerome says he is convinced televising the Commons debates is a good idea. Jerome, Speaker since last August, said televising debates might help make parliament real to more Canadians.”

But I think, perhaps, the most important factor influencing how we conduct the government’s business is the cost to us individually of being members of this House; both the cost in dollars and the cost in human terms. I would like to read an excerpt from Norman Webster’s column in the Globe and Mail recently, in which he said:

“Pauline McGibbon had some interesting observations in an interview the other day. I asked the Lieutenant Governor whether she had ever considered channelling her formidable talent into politics. She replied: ‘I don’t think I have the ability to stand the slings and arrows that one has to take in politics. You have got to have the hide of a rhinoceros to survive.’”

Mr. M. C. Germa (Sudbury): Ask the member for Timiskaming.

Mr. F. M. Havrot (Timiskaming): I haven’t got the face of one like the member for Sudbury.

Mr. Speaker: Order, please.

Mr. Havrot: When did he come out of the woodwork?

Mr. P. Taylor: Mr. Webster went on to say:

“Politics is a rough game and always will be and, indeed, probably should be. The question is: Is it becoming unnecessarily so? It is a serious question, because if the answer is yes, then we’re destined to get only politicians with rhino hides, and such hides unfortunately often cover rhino minds, with all the insight and flexibility that that implies.

“There are two disturbing trends. The first is a loading up of our political system’s tendencies to look to the politicians for a solution to every problem.”

Later he added:

“A second allied trend is to believe the worst of public figures. Not only should they tackle every problem, but if they come up with a solution that displeases, then it must have been for corrupt or cynical motives. The response then is not to criticize the politician’s reasoning, but to attack him personally.”

Mr. Deans: And Norman Webster wouldn’t do that.

Mr. P. Taylor: The member for Wentworth --

Mr. Deans: Norman Webster wouldn’t do a thing like that.

Mr. Foulds: He is speaking from personal knowledge.

Mr. P. Taylor: I’d like to go on record as saying that I think Mr. Webster and the Globe and Mail, by virtue of the existence of this column, are rendering a great service to this House.

Interjection by an hon. member.

Hon. Mr. Winkler: Did the member for Carleton East file his speech tonight?

Mr. Roy: He doesn’t have to, they will pick it up. They will pick up anything intelligent said in this place.

Hon. Mr. Winkler: What about that then?

Mr. Roy: We’ll worry about that when it happens.

Mr. Speaker: Order please.

Mr. P. Taylor: The Globe and Mail, by virtue of the space they make available and the choice they’ve made in the columnist to deal with this subject --

An hon. member: What is this?

Mr. P. Taylor: -- has made this Legislature more meaningful to more people and that should be extended, I believe, to broadcast coverage in this House.

Mr. Foulds: The member for Carleton East is not going to make the column with that speech.

An hon. member: His own men can’t take it.

Mr. P. D. Lawlor (Lakeshore): Doesn’t the member think that the day they put the Senate on television it will be the end?

Mr. Bullbrook: Yes. It will do away with every soap opera in Canada.

Mr. Lawlor: Thank God.

Mr. Speaker: Order please. The member for Carleton East has the floor.

Mr. Lawlor: He is doing very well today.

Mr. Bullbrook: The Senate will be known as “The Edge of Night.”

Mr. P. Taylor: “As the Legislature Turns.”

Mr. Foulds: I thought it would be “The Days of Our Lives.”

Mr. P. Taylor: Dealing with this matter of cost to us, as individuals, in dollar terms, I would like to put a few facts before the House.

In 1894, the year after this building was opened, there were 91 members.

Mr. Foulds: Some of them are still here, aren’t they?

Mr. P. Taylor: There were 91 members representing a total population of 2.1 million, or one member for every 23,000 Ontarians. Later this year, this House will accommodate 125 members, representing an estimated population of 8.1 million, or one for every 64,000 population.

Had Ontario retained the concept of representation on the basis of one member for every 23,000 of population, there would, later this year, be 352 members of this House. If 352 MPPs were earning $22,500, that would cost $7.9 million, rounded off to $8 million. Later this year there will be 125 members and they will be earning $22,500 and they will be costing the public treasury $2.8 million.

Now, 125 members today, representing more than three times the number of people that our predecessors represented, in my opinion are working much harder and longer, and yet the conditions, both practical and financial, under which we work perpetuate this job as a part-time rich man’s preserve.

An hon. member: Is the member kidding?

Mr. P. Taylor: If you don’t want to believe me, Mr. Speaker --

Mr. Havrot: The member’s leader wants to cut the cabinet by 40 per cent.

Mr. P. Taylor: -- would like to quote Mr. Mike Martin, the leader of the New Labrador Party --

An hon. member: A good man.

Mr. P. Taylor: -- who announced that he will resign from politics at the end of the current Legislature in Newfoundland-Labrador and move to Calgary, of all places.

Mr. Roy: That’s where the money is.

Mr. P. Taylor: I quote: “Quoting Mr. Martin, 36 years old, he says: ‘It’s a rich man’s game.’ He said his resignation will leave two vacancies -- and so forth. Now, here’s a fellow who is calling a spade a spade, in my opinion.

I would like to deal very quickly with my own situation.

Mr. Samis: Look at the size of Mr. Martin’s riding.

Mr. P. Taylor: Very big. It’s enormous.

The reality of my own situation is that I’m a man of modest means and when I was elected in November I had a modest bank account of just over $2,000 and I have depleted that. It’s now gone in the course of five months of service to the Legislature.

Mr. R. K. McNeil (Elgin): The member is living too high off the hog.

Mr. P. Taylor: I’ve been depleting my own savings at the rate of $400 a month. Morally, I think that it is wrong for the system to perpetuate that situation.

I believe that one’s personal commitment to this type of work should be enough. I ask what other occupational group in this country or this province takes a job that costs them money?

Mr. Lawlor: Listen, we are within the top 10 per cent bracket of the whole population.

Mr. P. Taylor: I’m sorry, my hon. friend, the member for wherever it is --

Mr. Foulds: Lakeshore.

An hon. member: A great riding.

Mr. P. Taylor: Lakeshore -- says I’m in one of the top 10 brackets. That’s fine, but it’s irrelevant. Who takes a job that costs them money, tell me that? I don’t mind investing my time.

Mr. Deans: How is it costing him money?

Mr. P. Taylor: It is costing me money because I have to retain a residence in Ottawa.

Mr. Deans: Right, which he would have had anyway.

Mr. P. Taylor: Yes. It is costing me money because --

Mr. Deans: And he gets an allowance for a residence here; okay.

Mr. P. Taylor: Yes. I’m not complaining about the flights, about the accommodation allowance, about the mileage on the car.

Mr. Deans: How is it costing him money?

Mr. P. Taylor: It is costing me money because I buy three meals a day while I’m in Toronto.

Mr. Deans: Wouldn’t he eat three meals anyway?

Mr. P. Taylor: No, the member knows the difference between buying meals in a city away from home and eating at home. If he doesn’t know that, he shouldn’t be here.

Mr. Deans: Didn’t he buy meals when he was in broadcasting?

Mr. P. Taylor: They were all paid for out of an expense account.

Mr. Deans: Oh, I see.

Mr. Germa: Shame, shame. Most people buy their own meals.

Mr. P. Taylor: Yes. Now I’d like to make a suggestion -- and I’m sorry I wasn’t here when the Camp commission was doing its thing.

Mr. Germa: Is he going to recommend a raise in pay?

Mr. P. Taylor: I’m recommending that we be paid a decent executive salary --

An hon. member: Holy smoke!

Mr. P. Taylor: -- that is entirely taxable, and that we be given a limited expense account which is --

Mr. J. E. Stokes (Thunder Bay): Did he talk about that during the election campaign?

Mr. P. Taylor: Yes, I did. I said that very thing on the --

Mr. Roy: What difference does that make?

Mr. P. Taylor: -- I’m trying to think of the date. I did at the Blackburn hamlet all-candidates meeting in my riding. I recall it was November, 1974, and I ask the member to consult the record.

I believe we should have a limited expense account, which is only payable by supporting it with vouchers. I think that we could write language that would cover the types of expenditures that should be included under such an arrangement. Again, I say, why should we be treated differently than any other groups in the business community? I believe this Legislature has gone a long way in the severance pay arrangements they have. I think the pension arrangements are very good.

Mr. Germa: I guess so.

Mr. P. Taylor: But you know, we are paid 15 cents a mile on our cars. Now why are we being treated differently? The government House leader -- who has fled the place now -- made this statement in the House:

“Members will recall that effective April 1, 1974, the government revised the mileage rates paid to an employee who uses his automobile on government business.”

And to cut it down short, I’ll tell you that Ontario public servants are now being paid 18 cents a mile for the use of their cars, and people who work in the north are getting another cent on top of that. And so they should -- they deserve it.

Mr. Laughren: That’s not the whole story; that’s only for the first 5,000 miles.

Mr. McNeil: He won’t need to worry after the next election.

Mr. P. Taylor: Yes, right -- and I appreciate that -- it’s for the first 5,000 miles.

Mr. Samis: Who is running for the Tories in Carleton East?

Mr. Roy: Whoever it is, the member for Stormont won’t have to worry about him.

Mr. P. Taylor: The government House leader then went on to say rates for mileage in excess of 5,000 were not changed. I’m not sure what they were at that time. But the point here is that we have no mechanism in this Legislature -- there is no independent, standing mechanism -- to deal with these problems as they arise.

In the time that I’ve been a member of this House, the bill at the hotel that I stay at has gone up twice. There is no mechanism in the Legislative Assembly Act for dealing with increases like that.

This $3,000 accommodation allowance very soon will be totally meaningless in terms of an apartment. I believe that the whole question of legislative indemnities should be independently decided upon and regularly regulated or regularly increased to deal with the cost of living. Again, why should we be treated differently from everyone else?

Mr. Lawlor: As long as it is not compulsory arbitration.

Mr. P. Taylor: I also intend to bring in a private member’s bill in the next few days that will deal with the whole concept of a constituency office and staff.

Mr. Germa: Now he is talking.

Mr. P. Taylor: I believe that we should be creating a system in this House that encourages people of all walks of life to seek office in this House, and we should be creating a system which sustains them in office without personal and financial hardship to the extent that it is possible.

And I go back -- I want to re-emphasize the point I made -- bad our predecessors opted for the concept of one member for every 23,000 of population, there would be 352 members of this House. We would probably have to have a new building and we would be spending $8 or $9 million a year. So why don’t we spend $5 or $6 million and really do the job properly?

What about the business of out-of-town members? I’m sure my hon. friends from Ottawa East, and Stormont, and Ottawa West (Mr. Morrow) and so on will appreciate the fact that because this House chooses not to sit on Wednesdays it makes it extremely difficult for out-of-town members to conduct both constituency and legislative business in an efficient fashion.

Mr. Samis: There are ways.

Mr. F. Taylor: Well, I’ll get together with my friend and talk to him about that later.

Mr. Roy: Why don’t they make it a Monday or a Friday?

Mr. P. Taylor: What I’m saying is that most of my hon. friends in this House have another source of income. They are lawyers, farmers, small businessmen or whatever -- most of them; not all of them. I am one of those who has no other form of income other than what I earn in this Legislature, and what I’m also trying to say is that the system as it is presently constituted militates against me being a full-time member. I am now actively seeking other sources of income that don’t constitute some form of conflict of interest, which is very difficult for me because my entire training in life has been as a journalist and, of course, to continue in political reporting would be an obvious conflict of interest for me. And no one would hire me on that basis.

An hon. member: He should have thought of that before he ran.

Mr. P. Taylor: Very quickly, I want to deal with the conduct of the House. My hon. friend from Ottawa East made some comments about the conduct of the question period. I want to say, Mr. Speaker, that I respect you, sir, very highly, and the office you hold, and I want you to know that I think you have one of the most difficult jobs that could possibly be handed out in this environment. But I also agree with my colleague from Ottawa East when he says we have to have a system which does not amount to different criteria for each side of the House.

The rules and the conditions that govern the asking of a question in this House are far too restrictive and confining, and rules don’t even exist with respect to the answering of that question. The conduct of this House is such that ministers have an entirely free rein in answering the questions. This is not good. If this continues, under the kind of political atmosphere that prevails in the province at this time, we in the opposition are going to be forced into an ever more combative and, if you like, disruptive type of tactic.

The ministers must be controlled in the way they answer the questions and in the length of time they take to answer the questions. They must be kept to the subject matter of the question; the answers must be relevant. They mustn’t be allowed to run off and make irrelevant political speeches in response to a specific question.

The standing committees of this House -- well, just before 6 o’clock this evening we went through what I think is an incredible exercise. My hon. friends from the New Democratic Party deluded themselves into thinking that the opposition parties had won a major victory in getting the standing committee to look at the Child Welfare Act tomorrow morning.

Mr. Lawlor: No, just a minor victory.

Mr. P. Taylor: At this point we don’t even know what room it is going to be in or what time it is going to be.

Mr. Germa: Ten o’clock tomorrow morning.

Mr. P. Taylor: Well, thank you. I didn’t know that. I’m glad the member knows that. But the important thing here is that we had a debate, the preceding debate on the Child Welfare Act, which was very constructive. It was a debate that I would be proud to send out to my constituents in a mailer form. All members of the House who participated in that debate did a great job. I was really interested in hearing the views of my friends to the extreme left, as well as my own colleagues and the minister.

Mr. Lawlor: Physically we are to the member’s extreme right.

Mr. P. Taylor: Thank you. It’s too bad that the government couldn’t have responded to this situation in a much more constructive way. It’s too bad the government took a year to bring forth this bill, which those who know it well and have looked at it and are experts in this field say really doesn’t represent very much. It took them a year to bring forward that bill that doesn’t represent very much and they bring it forward at the last moment, because municipalities have to set their budgets and everything else, and they are trying to manoeuvre the opposition parties into looking like the villains to the municipalities because we want to hold up the bill and we want to improve it. We want to get a good close look at it clause by clause and we also want the vested interests to have a look at it. We want the special interest groups, like the Children’s Aid Societies, to have a close look at it. If we play the game the government wants us to play, we’re going to look like villains to the cities and to the various Children’s Aid Societies.

Interjections by hon. members.

Mr. P. Taylor: Committees are the backbone of the Legislature. But in this Legislature the committees are not allowed to fulfil their true function. In effect, by conducting business the way this House does, in referring so few bills to the committees, this government is putting this House in the position of telling the public, “We know everything and we don’t need any outside consultation in terms of individual bills in this House.”

Hon. Mr. Winkler: That is completely wrong and the member knows it.

Mr. Roy: How many bills has the government sent to standing committee of this House? About one per cent.

Hon. Mr. Winkler: Oh, come on. The member knows that is wrong.

Mr. Roy: About one per cent, less than one per cent.

Hon. Mr. Winkler: That is wrong. Mr. Speaker, make the member withdraw that, that is wrong. He misled the House. However, it was only an interjection.

Mr. Roy: The House leader knows I am right.

Hon. Mr. Winkler: The member is not right and he knows he is not right.

Mr. Roy: Does the minister want to bet on it? Let’s look at the statistics. Of 201 bills only eight went to standing committee.

Mr. Speaker: Order, the member for Carleton East has the floor.

Mr. P. Taylor: I am afraid my hon. colleague from Ottawa East is correct, because we did the research on that and it is correct.

Hon. Mr. Winkler: That’s the prerogative of the Liberal Party.

Mr. Roy: I am sorry, it is four per cent. I apologize.

Hon. Mr. Winkler: Oh, too bad. That doesn’t surprise me either.

Mr. Roy: That’s some record.

Mr. Speaker: Order.

Mr. P. Taylor: Mr. Speaker, the sooner I get through here, the sooner my hon. friend from Thunder Bay can get up and do his thing.

Hon. Mr. Winkler: I like that.

Mr. P. Taylor: Yes, the minister had better listen to him.

In closing, I want to deal with the only substantive item in the Throne Speech which, of course, was the Liberal Party’s proposition for an ombudsman. Notwithstanding the language in the Throne Speech, we still feel it’s a very good proposition.

Hon. Mr. Winkler: Tell me something, is the member going to vote for or against that bill on second reading?

Mr. P. Taylor: It is funny that the minister should ask that because I have here a quote from the hon. member for Oxford (Mr. Parrott) who says:

“He won’t vote against the ombudsman bill but he doesn’t like it, Harry Parrott (PC -- Oxford) says of his government’s proposal to appoint a provincial ombudsman. He said yesterday in his reply to the Speech from the Throne that Legislature members have always performed the duties of an ombudsman in their ridings.

“Given additional funds to rent constituency offices and hire staff, funds comparable to the $8,400 federal parliamentarians receive for these purposes, members would be able to do an even better job, he said.

“‘Members are not spending as much time at Queen’s Park as they should be because constituency business is keeping them tied up at home. I do not want one ombudsman with a staff for the Province of Ontario. Unless there can be an ombudsman eyeball to eyeball with the people of every riding of Ontario, then I think we should not have one.’

“Outside the Legislature, Mr. Parrott said he would not oppose the government by casting a vote against the Speech from the Throne which suggested that an ombudsman be appointed.”

I would implore the member for Oxford to gird his loins and his guts and everything else and vote the way he feels he should on this issue. The member for Oxford and I are very like-minded on this issue, on the question of constituency offices and the whole role of individual members as perhaps miniature ombudsmen, or whatever you want to call them, Mr. Speaker.

The ombudsman for the province would fulfil a very real function. He would be dealing with major cases of injustice meted out at the hands of the bureaucracy. We deal as members with individual constituents who have relatively resolvable problems fairly quickly. They are just confused by the bureaucracy. They’re not suffering real injustice.

Mr. Foulds: Maybe the member’s aren’t; mine are.

Mr. P. Taylor: I think there is a very real role in this province for a very properly constituted ombudsman, but I also feel there is room for improving our ability to serve our constituents. We need proper pay, with proper taxation procedures, proper expense procedures and proper benefits, such as severance pay, pensions, mileage and all those kinds of things. We also need the kind of flexibility in the legislative Act to react to rising prices. I commend these points to my hon. colleagues, and I thank them for their indulgence in listening to me tonight.

Mr. Speaker: The hon. member for Thunder Bay.

Mr. J. E. Stokes (Thunder Bay): Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The first thing I would like to say is that I hope you will relay to the Speaker of the House my compliments for the job he has done thus far in this session and the hope that he will continue on in similar fashion.

I would also like to commend you, sir. I don’t think it has ever been put on the record that the member for York North (Mr. W. Hodgson) is in fact the deputy Speaker of this House and spends many, many hours in the chair listening to a lot of boring diatribe from time to time; he also doesn’t get the kind of recognition that he deserves.

I don’t think it has ever been put on the record that he does spend many a long, tiresome hour listening to things that are of not any particular interest to himself, and I would like to pay a tribute to him for his patience and his understanding. I hope that he too will continue in this very difficult job under very trying circumstances, and I want to commend him for the way he has conducted himself thus far in this House.

I have very mixed feelings about entering into this debate since it is traditionally called the Throne Speech debate but, as we all know, it is an ideal opportunity for members of whatever political stripe, and from whatever geographical locality across the province, to get up and say the things that are bothering them at any particular moment.

Rather than say anything critical about what was left out of the Throne Speech, I am going to confine my remarks to some very specific items that I think are worthy of comment. The first one, Mr. Speaker, is the matter of special occasion permits and the way they are handled by the Liquor Licence Board down here in Metropolitan Toronto.

Special occasion permits are handled by a special branch of the Liquor Licence Board, and a chap by the name of Mr. Gertley, who is the director, does an excellent job under very trying circumstances to satisfy the needs of people right throughout the province.

My complaint and my criticism isn’t directed to anybody in the board at the present time. I happen to think that they do an excellent job. But there have been a few instances of late that have made me realize that it’s no longer necessary to get approval for whatever we want to do in any place in the province, through some agency or some central office in Toronto.

I believe we have 70,000 civil servants in the province who are being paid reasonably good money, and if this government is serious about decentralization and about bringing services much closer to people, I think they should give the people in the regions some authority for making decisions.

Whether or not a special occasion permit is issued doesn’t require somebody at the ministerial or the deputy ministerial level to make that decision. The criteria are laid down, and there’s no reason in the world why we couldn’t have somebody at the district or regional level to whom some applicant could go and say they are going to hold a function a week or two weeks from now. It might be the chamber of commerce, a religious group, a service club group or a fraternal organization.

I want to tell you, Mr. Speaker, we have no end of difficulty with the mail service and breakdowns in communications in getting the kind of authority that you people down here in the urban centres take for granted, where all you have to do is pick up the phone and contact somebody down here. It isn’t as simple as that in areas that I represent.

I want to give you a specific example of an instance that happened just two weeks ago. An organization in the community of Terrace Bay wanted to get a special occasion permit to hold a dance where they wanted to serve alcoholic beverages. Two days before the event they phoned down here to find out why their application hadn’t been processed -- it had been mailed three weeks earlier -- only to find out from the special occasion permits branch that the application had not yet been received in Toronto.

They had sold several hundred tickets for this particular social event and it looked as though the whole thing was going to be a complete flop without authority to sell alcoholic beverages, which seem to be a must these days whenever people get together and socialize.

If it hadn’t been for the intercession of the member and the excellent co-operation I received from a northern affairs officer, who was able to utilize the services of a direct Telex line from northern Ontario --

Hon. Mr. Winkler: I went through the same thing last weekend, and I don’t have that service in my riding.

Mr. Stokes: Well, the minister may be able to cut a few more corners than I can.

Hon. Mr. Winkler: Not at all; they’re rough on me.

Mr. W. Ferrier (Cochrane South): It doesn’t pay to be on the government side then. Is that it?

Mr. Stokes: The point I am trying to make is that it shouldn’t be necessary to go down to 55 Lakeshore Blvd. in order to get authority to carry on a little social event in some small hamlet in northern Ontario.

Hon. Mr. Winkler: I agree.

Mr. Stokes: There are good people up in Thunder Bay, Timmins, Sudbury or Cornwall, and they are paid good money --

Mr. Ferrier: Owen Sound.

Mr. Stokes: And Owen Sound.

Hon. Mr. Winkler: That’s only been wet for three months, for goodness’ sake.

Mr. Stokes: All right, but the fact remains that there are competent people who are in a position to decide whether it’s a legitimate application and whether it’s a legitimate organization with a good cause; and there’s no reason why we have to come all the way down here to 55 Lakeshore Blvd. for authority to issue such a permit.

I want to suggest to the Chairman of Management Board that he talk to his colleague, the Minister of Consumer and Commercial Relations (Mr. Handleman) --

Hon. Mr. Winkler: I have already done that.

Mr. Stokes: Well, I’m adding my voice to his then, because I think it’s time we came out of the 19th century into the 20th century and say that we have sufficient people with the expertise in the regions to make that determination as to whether or not a special occasion permit should be issued.

Hon. Mr. Winkler: I’ll ask the member for his support when the time comes.

Mr. H. Worton (Wellington South): License the member for Thunder Bay.

Mr. Stokes: We’ve been promised a new bill dealing with the activities of the Liquor Control Board and the Liquor Licence Board, but I agree with my colleague from High Park (Mr. Shulman), who mentioned last Thursday night that he thinks a new bill will never be brought in because I don’t think the government has any idea about how it is even going to handle it.

Hon. Mr. Winkler: That gentleman isn’t always right, either.

Mr. Stokes: He’s not always right, but he’s been right so far. The government has been procrastinating for the last 2½ to three years on a new Liquor Licence Act and a new Liquor Control Act, and so far he’s been right.

Hon. Mr. Winkler: I think we had better straighten this out. Who is the member talking about?

Mr. Stokes: But in this particular instance with regard to the issuance of special occasion permits, I hope that anybody within hearing distance of my voice will get on the bandwagon and insist that authority for issuing such licences should reside with people in the regions rather than somebody down here in Metropolitan Toronto.

One of the other matters I want to talk about is consumer protection. We have people at the district level who will take into consideration what we consider to be violations of the rights of consumers, but because of the weakness in the present legislation in the Province of Ontario a good many of our consumers are being taken for a ride and are being ripped off. I want to lend credence to what I say by reading a few words from Some decisions which have been handed down by the Consumer Protection Bureau associated with the Ministry of Consumer and Commercial Relations.

This had to do with one of those fly-by-night organizations which go around the province saying, “We will install aluminum siding at a price which compares favourably with the price anywhere.” I have to report that this particular fly-by-night outfit comes from Val Caron, in the Province of Quebec; Anden Vinyl Products Ltd.

An hon. member: Val where?

An hon. member: That’s in the Sudbury area.

Mr. Stokes: I had a constituent who signed an agreement to enter into a contract for the installation of aluminum siding on his house. He made a down payment of $300 and went to the bank to arrange for a loan to repay the balance but found out that either the money wasn’t available at the bank or it was available at too high an interest rate. They felt they couldn’t afford going through with it so they immediately picked up the phone, contacted Anden Vinyl Products Ltd. and said, “We want out of this contract; consider it cancelled and please refund our $300.”

Well, nothing happened. They didn’t get their money back nor did Anden Vinyl come to put the aluminum siding on the home and the upshot of it was, since they couldn’t make any headway, they brought it to my attention. I, in turn, brought it to the attention of Mr. Goudy, who is the director of the consumer protection bureau associated with the Ministry of Consumer and Commercial Relations. We both tried to prevail upon Anden Vinyl Products and, of course, they quite rightly pointed out that since the 48-hour cooling-off period applied only to those people who had indicated in writing that they wanted out, they had the protection of the Act. It wasn’t good enough for anyone to phone in to the company and state he wanted to terminate the contract or didn’t want to go through with the contract.

As a result of it all, my constituents lost $300; they didn’t get the job done; and there is no recourse under present legislation. Mr. Goudy is quite right and I want to read the last two paragraphs in his letter:

“In any event your suggesting to have the rescission period printed on the face of executory contracts was a good one. Some firms are presently doing this, using it as a selling point to indicate to customers that they are not being high-pressured into buying.

“I have also recommended that the rescission period be extended from two days to five and I thank you for your concern in this matter as your remarks are most welcome.”

That is just an indication of where existing consumer protection legislation falls far short of the mark. My constituent lost $300 and has no recourse.

I hope the four cabinet ministers over there will prevail upon the Minister of Consumer and Commercial Relations to bring in the kind of consumer protection legislation which, as outlined in Mr. Goudy’s letter, will offer real protection to the consumers of this province rather than allowing them to be ripped off by unconscionable operators like the one I have just mentioned.

Another incident I would like to draw to your attention, Mr. Speaker, is yet another one that I brought to the attention of the consumer protection bureau. It has to do with a small businessman in my riding who has to buy through jobbers and distributors and when he sold two items -- one was a boat compass that he had had to stock for several weeks and it was factory sealed. When he made a sale he opened it up and he inspected it before the customer; the customer having paid something like $27.25 for it. He opened it up and inspected it, only to find out that a part of the thing was missing. It wasn’t functional without this part and, obviously, there had been a shortage in the factory. So he refunded the purchase price of $27.25 to the customer and he sent the article to the jobber from whom he had purchased it. This chap who sold the article was the proprietor of the Western Tire Store in Schreiber and he sent the compass back, intact as he had found it, factory packed, to Mr. M. J. Colyer, the general manager of Timberline Saw and Marine Ltd., Trout Lake Road in North Bay, Ont., who was the distributor.

He said it was a general rule of their company that you had to notify them of any shortages within 14 days, and if you failed to do so you weren’t entitled to any refund or any kind of consideration.

The proprietor of the store pointed out to Timberline Saw and Marine Ltd. and pointed out to me that in many, many instances when those things come factory packed they may sit on the shelves for three or four weeks, and sometimes two or three months, and you don’t know what’s inside these factory-packed articles until you make the sale. In fact, quite often the customer won’t even question it if it comes in a factory-packed box, sealed with plastic. He would probably take it home and wouldn’t question whether or not it’s in order or if anything is missing until he goes to install it on his boat or whatever.

Anyway, this company said: “No. Since you didn’t register a complaint within 14 days you have no recourse under our present policy.”

The proprietor of the Western Tire Store also encountered another problem with the same distributor, Timberline Saw and Marine Ltd. of North Bay. It was with a firm that Mr. Goudy tried to contact and it was called Anglo Traders Ltd., which is now out of business. An order was placed for duck canvas covers for snowmobiles, but the covers received were made of plastic. When he tried to return them for replacement it was turned down because he hadn’t done so within a matter of 14 days and, of course, it was never brought to his attention until he went to sell one of them and he said: “I have a duck canvas snowmobile cover that sells for something like $14.” When he went to take them out of the case and look at them he found out that they weren’t duck at all; they were made of plastic, and because of the statute of limitations of 14 days, according to the operation of this particular distributor or jobber, he was again turned down.

Mr. Goudy and I are trying to prevail upon Timberline to refund and make good these two articles -- one was because they were improperly packed and there were shortages at the factory and the other one was misrepresentation -- but there is nothing in the Consumer Protection Act in the Province of Ontario that protects a customer, or even a small retailer, under such circumstances.

There again, through you, Mr. Speaker, I would like to prevail upon the four cabinet ministers to bring this to the attention of the Minister of Consumer and Commercial Relations.

The final item on consumer protection that I would like to bring up is contained in a letter that I received from the director of the Lake Superior Board of Education, which is the one along the north shore of Lake Superior and covers Manitouwadge. He wrote this letter to me and he says:

“Re pricing inflation:

“In early November, the Manitouwadge high school ordered from Moyer’s School Supplies Ltd. two main drive belts as needed parts to repair a Graflex 16 mm movie projector used in the school for audio-visual purposes and manufactured by Singer Ltd.

“After a wait of nine to 10 weeks and without receipt of the required parts the school contacted Moyer’s by telephone to determine that the order had been delayed, as it was not high priority on their list.

“The school then determined to contact one of the service outlets provided by Singer to service equipment sold by other agencies, such as Moyer’s. The service outlet advised that although they did not sell directly to the public, but did so only through a middle agency such as Moyer’s Ltd., they could provide service and, in some instances, parts.

“Subsequently, by telephone order the two required drive belts were finally received at Manitouwadge high school in early February. Finally, in late February, the two belts originally ordered from Moyer’s in November arrived complete with invoice.”

This brings me to the point of this letter.

“As you will notice on the attached photocopies of the invoices provided by each of the respective companies, Moyer’s has charged the Lake Superior Board of Education $10.50 per drive belt, while the manufacturing firm, through its service outlet, has provided the same two drive belts for the price of $3.60 per unit.

“This would indicate to me that the markup between the original manufacturer, that is Singer, and the sales outlet to normal school purchasing agents, which is Moyer’s for Singer products, is somewhere in the vicinity of 300 per cent.

“This is an astounding markup and perhaps points out an unfortunate fact. Boards of education are not only fighting general inflationary increases, as is every other corporation in this province, but are perhaps being ripped off by some sales and distributing agencies at least.”

Hon. Mr. Winkler: They should know if the marketplace in which they are buying that product is competitive. They should know.

Mr. Laughren: Name the marketplace that’s competitive.

Mr. Stokes: Perhaps the minister didn’t --

Hon. Mr. Winkler: Unlike the other situation -- which I didn’t hear the conclusion of -- I would have sued them.

Mr. Stokes: Perhaps the minister didn’t get the import. If you buy directly from the manufacturer, which is Singer, you can get it for $3.60. But if you have to go through the distributor or the jobber, as was the case here, they paid $10.50; so there is a mark up of 300 per cent.

Hon. Mr. Wilder: But if the member knows that, surely they know it.

Mr. Stokes: Who?

Hon. Mr. Winkler: The purchasing agent of the board, or whoever the member is talking about.

Mr. Stokes: They didn’t know until after they paid for it. That is why he brought it to my attention. He says he is being ripped off. Now what is the minister suggesting; that they go to court to recover the difference between $10.50 and $3.60?

Hon. Mr. Winkler: No, I am not talking about that case. I am talking about the compass, the first one the member quoted.

Mr. P. Taylor: On your feet, Mr. Minister.

Hon. Mr. Winkler: Don’t worry, the member for Thunder Bay and I get along.

Mr. Stokes: All right, the letter continues:

“The individuals in this board of education responsible for purchasing have been instructed to compare prices carefully between firms when buying for school division needs. Now they do that wherever possible.

“It might be appropriate, however, for the government of Ontario to look more seriously into the matter. It’s pretty obvious to me that this province and, in fact, this nation cannot stand that kind of inflated pricing. I shall leave the matter in your hands to do with as you decide.”

Of course I’ve taken the liberty, Mr. Speaker, of bringing up that and the other two items just to highlight the need for stricter enforcement of consumer protection laws and, where necessary, to shore them up by bringing in the kind of consumer protection laws that in some realistic fashion do, in fact, protect the consumers of this province.

Another area that I want to get into, Mr. Speaker, is the high cost of gasoline and other petroleum products. I’ve had considerable dialogue with the former Minister of Consumer and Commercial Relations, (Mr. Clement) who has gone on to bigger and better things. I detailed what I thought was an unfair practice by oil companies and oil distributors in that many areas of the province are being charged 10 to 15 cents more per gallon of gasoline than are people in other areas of the province. I’ve asked him to look into it and to see that the purchasers of gasoline and home heating oil were given the kind of protection that I thought they deserved and needed. He has procrastinated and hasn’t done a thing about it.

Now the recent announcements by Esso and the other major oil producers and distributors have only tended to aggravate it. It’s extremely difficult to get the Minister of Consumer and Commercial Relations to do anything at all about it. It’s impossible to get the Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs in Ottawa to do anything about it. Where do we turn? Where do people in northern Ontario turn when almost every time we go to the gas pumps they’ve increased the price by a cent or two? There just doesn’t seem to be any end to it.

I’ve made some comparisons for my own satisfaction and for the benefit of the House in this debate this evening. I find that the cost of gasoline -- that is regular gasoline or what we refer to as No. 2 gasoline -- varies anywhere from 60 cents to 72 cents right within Metropolitan Toronto. Of course, if one wants unleaded one pays three cents extra.

When leaded gas came in it was supposed to provide much less wear and tear on the inner parts and the moving parts of the motors. They used to say, “We are coming out with a new kind of gasoline. We’ll put some lead in it. It has an anti-knock effect and we’ll charge three cents extra for putting the lead in the gasoline which will make automobiles run more efficiently. Then for a number of years they had a new kind of carburetor on cars which was causing a lot of pollution and so the environmentalists took over.

They said, “We are going to impose some constraints on the kinds of carburetors and the kinds of exhaust systems and everything else you have on your cars. We are going to make you install pollution abatement equipment on your cars. We are going to install catalytic converters on your cars. And you are going to have to use unleaded gasoline in those cars which are equipped with catalytic converters. And for the privilege of using a catalytic converter-equipped automobile we are going to charge you three cents extra to take the lead out of your gasoline.”

There is the situation in Toronto at the present time. One can pay anywhere from 60 cents to 72 cents for a gallon of No. 2 gasoline and if one wants the lead out, one pays three cents extra for them to take it out. Ten years ago it used to cost one something to put it in. I think we are getting ripped off; 60 to 72 cents for a gallon of No. 2 gasoline in Metropolitan Toronto.

In Sudbury it’s anywhere from 63 to 67 cents a gallon. At all the stations along Highway 401, where they consider they have a captive driving public, it’s up to 73 cents a gallon. Some members who are paying 60 or 62 cents say they are getting ripped off on Highway 401. I can’t get too excited about the people who are being charged 73 cents a gallon on Highway 401 because I found that if one buys from Beaver in Windsor one pays 58 cents a gallon for regular. Of course, if one goes to the name brands, one can pay as high as 63 cents for No. 2 gasoline in Windsor. I asked a friend of mine the cost of a gallon of gasoline in Cornwall, which is as far east as one can go in Ontario and far away from the western Canada refineries and the refineries in Sarnia. I asked, “How much do you pay for a gallon of gasoline in Cornwall which is east of that imaginary line supposedly serviced by the oil producers and the refineries in central and western Canada?” Lo and behold, I find out that one can pay as low as 61 cents a gallon by buying No. 2 gas from an independent or 63 cents a gallon for the name brands such as Esso, Texaco, Gulf and Shell.

The curious part of all this, Mr. Speaker, is that all of the oil sold east of that line, the Ottawa Valley line, doesn’t come from Canada at all. It’s offshore; it comes from either Venezuela or the Middle East. And that is the oil that is subsidized -- not only subsidized directly by the federal government because it is more expensive offshore oil; it is subsidized by everybody in Canada, including Ontario.

So if anyone thinks the people in Metropolitan Toronto are getting ripped off if they have to pay up to 67 cents a gallon or up to 70 cents a gallon, or if anyone thinks the people on 401 are being ripped off when they have to pay 73 cents, or if anyone thinks the people in Sudbury who have to pay 67 cents are being ripped off, I want to advise him that the price of No. 2 gasoline in my home town and in most communities along the north shore of Lake Superior is 77 cents a gallon. It is we who are living in northern Ontario who are subsidizing those users east of that Ottawa line of the so-called more expensive offshore oil from Venezuela and the Middle East.

Not only are we being ripped off, but we’re really being shafted. We’re really being shafted. We are so much closer to the sources of our traditional oil. We live in mid-Canada. The district of Thunder Bay is the linchpin for the whole country. We live in mid-Canada, we’re anywhere up to 1,500 miles closer to the source of the traditional oil in western Canada, and we pay the highest price anywhere in Canada.

Mr. Foulds: Where is the government’s consumer protection?

Mr. Ferrier: What is the minister going to do about it?

Mr. Stokes: When you can buy offshore oil from Venezuela and from the Middle East in Cornwall for 63 cents a gallon, and us poor suckers living in mid-Canada, in Thunder Bay, are paying 77 cents, there’s a discrepancy of 14 cents on every gallon we buy.

Mr. Ferrier: A royal ripoff.

Mr. Stokes: I have brought it to the attention of successions of ministers of this government over here, and there’s no way that they are disposed to do anything about it and come to our defence.

Mr. Foulds: Right on.

Mr. Stokes: I want to ask both the Provincial Secretary for Resources Development and the Provincial Secretary for Social Development (Mrs. Birch) whether they see any justice in a situation like that?

Hon. A. Grossman (Provincial Secretary for Resources Development): We know the problem. What is the solution?

Mr. Stokes: The solution is that the government look at the oil companies and say, “Change your pricing practices.”

Hon. Mr. Grossman: Or?

Mr. Stokes: “Or we’ll take them over.”

Hon. Mr. Grossman: We will take them over in the province? Does the member really think that will work?

Mr. Foulds: Sure.

Mr. Stokes: Why not? Is there any justification for us paying --

Mr. Foulds: If the government can equalize beer prices it can equalize oil and gas prices. It is the same thing.

Mr. Stokes: They’re doing it in Nova Scotia. They’re doing it on the sales tax on gasoline.

Hon. Mr. Grossman: It’s not the same thing.

Mr. Stokes: They’re doing it on the sales tax on gasoline right in Nova Scotia.

Mr. Ferrier: They’re doing it in British Columbia, aren’t they?

Mr. Stokes: There are many alternatives that the government has at its disposal. All I’m saying is that since the members opposite are the government of the Province of Ontario, they do have the responsibility to come to the assistance and to the aid of consumers in northern Ontario. Any time that the government sees a discrepancy of 14 cents per gallon on a gallon of gasoline, there’s got to be something wrong.

Hon. Mr. Grossman: We agree with the member in principle. We would like to have a solution which is equitable.

Mr. Stokes: The government did it with beer. It did it with beer.

Mr. Ferrier: It does it with liquor.

Hon. Mr. Grossman: With great respect, Mr. Speaker, if the hon. member wouldn’t mind, the hon. member is trying to equate petroleum with beer. Really, he knows that it’s not an equation which can stand up to scrutiny at all. There’s no international cartel in beer; I have no hesitation in saying, and everybody knows, that there is international control of petroleum which is difficult for any nation, let alone a province, to resolve. Certainly, that has become apparent in the last year or so.

Interjections by hon. members.

Hon. Mr. Grossman: It is very difficult.

Mr. Foulds: He is saying they are bigger than he is.

Interjections by hon. members.

Hon. Mr. Grossman: I have no hesitation in saying that anyone who knows anything about the situation will say that it’s very difficult, if not impossible, with the controls that are available to nations today, to control the price of petroleum in the way nations would like to control it, let alone provinces, because of the international aspect of the power of the petroleum producers and the petroleum people. The member knows that.

Mr. Ferrier: That’s exactly why we need Petrocan to try to get some control.

Interjections by hon. members.

Mr. Stokes: Mr. Speaker, what the minister seems to be saying is that he fully appreciates and realizes that we are being ripped off by the pricing policies and the distribution policies of the major oil producers in this country and that he is either unwilling or unable to do anything about it.

An hon. member: Not yet.

Hon. Mr. Grossman: With great respect, Mr. Speaker, the hon. member is being quite unfair. I didn’t agree that they are being ripped off. I didn’t say that we weren’t prepared to do something. We say we appreciate the problem; we don’t have the solution. If the hon. member has a solution that is practical we would be very glad to consider it, because we have struggled with this problem for a long period of time.

It has been discussed at great length at various levels in the government. We do not have a solution which is practical. The hon. member’s proposed solution just isn’t practical and if he can tell us one that is, we would be very glad to consider it.

Mr. Stokes: The first thing we could do is lower the 19 cents a gallon that the government is getting on every gallon that is sold in the province. Lower that by four or five cents a gallon in northern Ontario.

Mr. Speaker: This is getting into a debate now.

Hon. Mr. Grossman: Well, I don’t know that this isn’t supposed to be a debate, Mr. Speaker.

An hon. member: There is no debate.

Hon. Mr. Grossman: If the hon. member wants a debate, that is supposed to be the name of the game.

Mr. Speaker: Order, order.

Hon. Mr. Grossman: I’ll debate it, but if the hon. member doesn’t want to --

Mr. Speaker: Order, order. If the member for Thunder Bay wants to give the floor up to the minister, why it’s okay with the Speaker --

Hon. Mr. Grossman: The hon. member knows perfectly well --

Mr. Speaker: -- but I can’t allow --

Mr. Bullbrook: On a point of order if I may, I think this is very interesting and I invite this type of yielding back and forth. It’s debate if you permit it, Mr. Speaker.

Hon. Mr. Grossman: That’s what it is supposed to be. Otherwise it becomes almost meaningless long speeches without any possibility of an exchange of ideas. Quite frankly, the hon. member knows that so far we haven’t been able to find a way by which we could reduce the tax and make sure that it isn’t merely a means of the local distributor merely adding that onto the cost. There is just no way of doing that practically.

Mr. Stokes: We can surely monitor that.

Hon. Mr. Grossman: One can’t just say, with great respect, that we can monitor that. Suppose we monitored it and we said, “Now that we have reduced your gasoline tax by five cents a gallon, or 10 cents a gallon, we expect you to reduce your price by 10 cents a gallon,” and suppose the service station just doesn’t do it. How would the hon. member suggest we control that?

Mr. Stokes: What would I do to control it? Take it over, if I had to.

Hon. W. Newman (Minister of the Environment): Now he is telling us.

Mr. Stokes: Take it over. The government took over the distribution system for Ontario Hydro.

Mr. Speaker: Order. Would the member for St. Andrew-St. Patrick take his seat? Would the hon. minister take his seat at the present time and let --

Hon. Mr. Grossman: Mr. Speaker, if the hon. member is suggesting that the solution to that is the nationalization of the means of distribution of petroleum then --

Mr. Stokes: As a last resort.

Hon. Mr. Grossman: If that’s what he is suggesting, then let him suggest that. it may very well be that may be a means of controlling it. On the other hand, it may be just getting ourselves into a trap, because we really don’t have control of the international distribution of petroleum by the producers to make sure the distribution of petroleum goes into other provinces and to other jurisdictions, because they are just big enough to do that. I am not suggesting that I agree they should be that big or that they should be that powerful. I have my own ideas about the control they have over the international distribution of petroleum, but at this moment we are not in a position as a province to control that, and I don’t like --

Mr. Samis: Who runs Ontario?

Mr. Roy: Gerry Regan is controlling gas.

Mr. Speaker: Order. Would the hon. minister take his seat, please?

Hon. Mr. Grossman: The hon. member wants to listen --

Mr. Speaker: I don’t care what the hon. member wants.

Hon. Mr. Grossman: All right.

Mr. Speaker: If the hon. member wants to ask the minister these questions, there is a question period tomorrow afternoon from 2 to 3.

Mr. Roy: Gerry Regan is controlling gas in Nova Scotia.

Mr. Stokes: I want to thank the minister for at least being interested enough to get involved.

Interjections by hon. members.

Mr. Stokes: It’s nice to know that somebody’s listening, and I want to thank him.

Mr. Foulds: He’s not going to take any action but he’s listening.

Mr. Stokes: But there are a good many alternatives that are open to the government, particularly to the minister as the Provincial Secretary for Resources Development. And there are a good many initiatives the Minister of Natural Resources (Mr. Bernier) could take. The provincial Treasurer (Mr. McKeough) could take many initiatives and the Minister of Energy (Mr. Timbrell) could. As the provincial secretary is talking to them on a daily basis --

Mr. Roy: And the Minister of the Environment.

Mr. Stokes: -- why doesn’t he use a little ingenuity on behalf of the people that sent me here to speak for them? Any time that we’re paying 14 cents a gallon more --

Hon. Mr. Grossman: The Speaker says the member will have to ask that tomorrow.

Mr. Foulds: Well, take the question as notice.

Mr. Stokes: Yes, let him take the question as notice and maybe he’ll have an answer for me tomorrow.

Hon. Mr. Grossman: The Minister of Energy will have to answer that one.

Interjections by hon. members.

Mr. Stokes: This is just one of the many complaints that we in the north have that are most legitimate. The distances that we have to travel are so much greater. I could have made the same argument with regard to home-heating oil. I think I recall the hon. member for Huron-Bruce (Mr. Gaunt) complaining about the discrepancy in the cost of home-heating oil right down here in the area that he knows better than I do.

Mr. Roy: And in eastern Ontario.

Mr. Stokes: It’s even more acute in the north where climatic conditions are much more severe, and where winters are much longer. People opposite don’t seem to be too concerned about it.

Hon. Mr. Grossman: I think it costs too much in the south too.

Mr. Stokes: If it’s too much in the south we’re really getting ripped off in the north. Since people opposite are the government, we think in the north that they have a responsibility to come to grips with that problem.

An hon. member: What are they doing over there?

Mr. Ferrier: Why do they want to sit over there if they don’t want to govern rightly?

Mr. Stokes: Mr. Speaker, I’m going on a little longer than I had anticipated, but the hon. minister got involved and he has preempted some of my time.

Hon. Mr. Grossman: At the member’s invitation.

Mr. Stokes: Fair enough. You may recall, Mr. Speaker, that there was a conference held out in western Canada somewhat over a year ago at the request of the Premiers of the four western provinces, where they had Hon. Pierre Elliott Trudeau, Hon. Jean Marchand and all of those people sitting down and talking about the prices in transportation costs as they affected and pertained to the western provinces. As a result of that dialogue and a commitment made during the last federal election campaign out there, the feds agreed to sit down and talk to the Premiers and the ministers in those four western provinces. On Feb. 25 of this year there was an announcement:

“An agreement in principle toward eliminating basic transportation inequities against western Canada was announced Monday by Transport Minister Jean Marchand and ministers responsible for transportation of the western provinces.

“In a joint communique, the four western provinces described the agreement as a major breakthrough. The ministers reached agreement specifically on five principles, including rate groupings to include small communities in western Canada in the same rate group as the nearest large cities.”

For instance, the town of Olds, 50 miles north of Calgary, would be in the same rate group as Calgary and no extra charge would be levied for hauling the goods to Olds from Calgary. Another was that Ottawa, through the Canadian Transport Commission, would reject future applications for across-the-board rate increases, and all future railway applications to increase their rates must be accompanied by full-cost disclosure.

There is to be a change in the formula of maximum rate restrictions so that more favourable rates, when applicable, would be applied to shippers. There is to be an elimination of long-haul, short-haul anomalies, so that intermediate rates will not exceed long-haul rates on shipments destined to or originating from the western region, except where particular competitive circumstances justified special rates to long-haul destinations.

In addition to that there were commitments by Mr. Marchand and other federal ministers. A joint federal-provincial programme at a cost of $157 million is under way to upgrade major east-west highways in the Prairie provinces to standards similar to those in British Columbia, as well as a joint federal-provincial programme, at a cost of $400 million, to provide access roads into the provincial northlands of western Canada to help develop natural resources and eliminate isolation of northern communities. There were several other commitments.

I want to know why this government hasn’t made representations -- or if it has, why haven’t we seen some results -- representations to the federal cabinet, to the Prime Minister of this country and to the Hon Mr. Marchand, on behalf of residents of Ontario, particularly northwestern Ontario, because we are discriminated against by those inequitable freight rates in northwestern Ontario in the same way the Prairie provinces are.

We have four members of Parliament, all on the side of government, all Liberals, and they presumably got a commitment from their government when they were discussing the freight rate anomalies with the provinces in western Canada, that we in northwestern Ontario would be given similar consideration.

Now, there isn’t any mention or indication that the freight rate anomalies that exist in northern Ontario, particularly in northwestern Ontario, are going to be taken into consideration in any restructuring of freight rate policies or programmes in this province.

I want to know why the Ministry of Transportation and Communications, which is responsible for transportation in this province, hasn’t made the kind of representations we think should have been made on behalf of people living in northwestern Ontario.

Mr. Speaker, I want to give you two or three example of how we are getting it in the neck. For instance, I took a minimum shipment of 70,000 lb -- that is one boxcar load -- of mill products and proceeded to find out what the date would be from the BC interior to Dartmouth, NS, to Fredericton, and to all of those cities down on the eastern seaboard. I asked one of our major carriers to give me a pricing per hundredweight on that minimum shipment of 70,000 lb from the BC interior to the Atlantic seaboard. They quoted a price of $2.58 per hundredweight for that 70,000-lb shipment.

“Fair enough,” I said. “Now give me the price of the same shipment from the BC interior to the city of Thunder Bay.” Thunder Bay is in mid-Canada, 1,500 miles closer to the source than the Atlantic seaboard. The price they quoted me on that same shipment was $2.56 per hundredweight -- two cents per hundredweight difference if you ship from the BC interior to the city of Thunder Bay, or from the BC interior to the Atlantic seaboard -- and we are 1,500 miles closer!

I wrote to the Minister of Transport, Mr. Speaker. Do you know what he said? He said we have to deal with the theoretical cost of moving that same shipment through the Panama Canal by boat. So theoretically if somebody was taking that shipment from British Columbia, through the Panama and up the eastern coast to seaboard cities such as Dartmouth and Halifax, conceivably that would be the rate they would charge. The two major carriers meet that theoretical price but who is subsidizing that shipment all the way from British Columbia down to the Maritimes? I will tell member who is subsidizing them. We are, in mid-Canada. We’re the guys who are getting it in the neck, in the same way as we’re getting it in the neck for every gallon of gas we buy and for every gallon of home heating oil we buy. We get it in the neck every time.

Let me carry it a little bit further, Mr. Speaker. I took the same shipment -- 70,000 lb -- from a town in my riding, Longlac, which produces plywood, lumber and a waferboard product. I said to the common carrier, “Give me a price for a minimum shipment of 70,000 lb from Longlac to the city of Thunder Bay.” It’s roughly 200 miles. They quoted me a price of 56 cents per hundredweight from Longlac to Thunder Bay, right within the region. I said, “Fine and dandy. Give me the price for that same shipment from Longlac to Ottawa and Toronto.” It was 58 cents per hundredweight; two cents difference. It’s about three times the distance and it only cost two cents more to ship 100 lb of lumber, plywood and other mill products all the way down to Ottawa than it did to ship it within the region.

I don’t know whether members realize the significance of that but we’re getting it in the neck in northwestern Ontario, in mid-Canada, with regard to the items we would like to import from BC. If somebody’s going to establish a business in mid-Canada, in the district of Thunder Bay, and has to bring in that material he has to pay the same charges to bring it in that someone would pay if he were shipping it all the way to the east coast. If somebody is looking for somewhere to establish a business there are no advantages for us in mid-Canada with regard to transportation costs. They’d say, “We could establish in Toronto, Ottawa or Dartmouth or any place.” That’s the thing.

Mr. Foulds: They can’t even ship within the region.

Mr. Stokes: Somebody might say “We would like to establish a plant somewhere in Ontario; does there seem to be any obvious or apparent advantage in building our plant closer to the supply?” If they were using the lumber we produce in northwestern Ontario, if they were using the plywood we produce in northwestern Ontario or the waferboard we produce in northwestern Ontario, normally, under normal events when one pays transportation costs on a ton-mile, they would say, “Let’s construct closer to the source of the material.” That isn’t the way the free enterprise system works at all. With stuff we try to ship out, we get it in the neck.

Mr. Foulds: It isn’t free enterprise.

Mr. Stokes: With stuff we have to bring in, we get it in the neck. There is no advantage to living in central Canada. These are the kinds of things the government must do on our behalf because our federal representatives aren’t saying anything in Ottawa on our behalf. We’ve got four of them up there, wall-to-wall Liberals. The Tories must go down and tell Ottawa that we want the same kind of deal in northwestern Ontario that the feds gave the western provinces.

Hon. Mr. Grossman: I’m sure the Minister of Transportation and Communications has done that.

Mr. Foulds: Is the provincial secretary sure?

Mr. Stokes: That’s what I want the government to do. Let the provincial secretary show me he’s done that.

Hon. Mr. Grossman: If the Speaker would allow it, I’d like to add something, but I’m not sure he would.

Mr. Stokes: When the provincial secretary gets his facts straight, the next time I’m up on my feet I’ll concede the floor to him.

Hon. Mr. Grossman: Let the member ask the Speaker if he may do that now.

Mr. Stokes: Mr. Speaker, I’ve gone on much longer than I should have because of the interjections. I had two or three more topics that I wanted to get into. I wanted to speak on the Ministry of Natural Resources. I wanted to be able to tell the House that I think the reforestation programme is in a sad state of affairs in this province. I wanted to tell members that the reorganization within the ministry is highly suspect even by people and from people within the ministry.

I wanted to talk about the acute alcoholism in many areas of this province. I wanted to say something constructive about how I think we could come to grips with some of those problems. But I want to quote from a current “News for Friends,” that comes out of Quetico. It was written by John W. Newburn and it says:

“People can be divided into three groups -- Those who make things happen; those who watch things happen; and those who wonder what has happened.”

I don’t know whether this government falls into the first, the second or the third category.

Hon. W. Newman: I will tell the member we are the first and he is the third.

Mr. Stokes: I want to tell the minister that the people that I represent in northwestern Ontario in the riding of Thunder Bay want to know what is happening. I think this government had better come clean and justify its 32 years of control and rule in this province. If it doesn’t heed many of the things that I’ve brought to its attention -- hopefully in a reasonable, positive and responsible way -- then come the next provincial election the present members of this government are going to be wondering what has happened. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker: The hon. member for Kent.

Mr. J. P. Spence (Kent): Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure for me to take part in this Throne debate. I first wish to congratulate you on the way you are carrying out your duties as Speaker of this honourable assembly.

You have proved to me that you are fair and impartial in your decisions and I wish you well in that honourable position.

I also wish to congratulate the chairman of the committee of the whole House on their appointments -- the hon. member for York North and the hon. member for Simcoe East (Mr. G. E. Smith). I also wish them well in their honourable positions.

Mr. Speaker, on June 9 I will have been a member of this Legislature for 20 years. So I think that you will agree with me that I’ve heard my share of Speeches from the Throne. Now I’m just a simple farmer, Mr. Speaker, and I’m not given to talking in extreme terms. But it is without question that this is the most disappointing, uninspiring, downright vague Throne Speech I have heard in those years.

The government tells me our prosperity has been challenged because of unprecedented inflation abroad, because of the world recession. We would have met that challenge, Mr. Speaker, and come through this with flying colours if Ontario finances had been handled with any degree of wisdom and any degree of responsibility.

The situation calls for a strong and decisive response from the people. This government says that it will get that strong and decisive response from the people on election day. They’ll get exactly what I think they are asking for, Mr. Speaker. Moderation and restraint in pricing of goods and services sounds like an excellent idea, and I’m sure every taxpayer in Ontario would be pleased to see moderation and restraint in almost any area of this government’s activities.

I must say it is a pity the government hasn’t shown a little more moderation and restraint in the past when they were fooling around with the expensive magnetic levitation transit system, before finally abandoning it. They were also forcing costs of regional government plans on our communities.

The people would accept regional government, surely, if regional government is such a wonderful idea. It should not be necessary to use any lever to persuade communities to accept it. In every case where regional government has been put into effect, administration costs have increased alarmingly.

The government has given adjustment grants to tide the communities over in this initial period. However, I understand that adjustment grants will terminate within five years. What happens then? Will the people be faced with coping with staggering costs? Will the government bring in some other measures to make the Ontario taxpayers subsidize these grandiose schemes.

At a recent meeting in Toronto, an electrical convention, the Premier of the Province of Ontario was loudly applauded when he said there would be no further regional governments. In fact, the applause was so loud that the people did not, at first hand, hear the end of his statement when he added “at this time.” As usual, Mr. Speaker, with so many of the government’s statements, the sting is in the tail.

On regional government expenditures, Mr. Speaker, I’ve gathered as much information as possible. The Ottawa-Carleton regional government in the year 1969 had $22,985,000 in adjustment grants devoted to it; in 1970 there was $27,084,000 which the government gave as adjustment grants; in 1972, $37,749,000 in adjustment grants; in 1973, $43,308,000. The Niagara regional government received $22,252,000 in the year 1970; in 1971, $28,119,000; in 1972, it received $35,867,000, and in 1973, $41,240,000.

M. Bullbrook: Staggering amount.

Mr. Spence: The regional government of York in 1970 received $14,750,000; in 1971, $18,114,000; in 1972, $20,445,000, and in 1973, $26,527,000.

The time has come when this government, Mr. Speaker, must seriously reconsider its position in regard to regional government. These sums are staggering to a layman in finance.

The government promises it will maintain Ontario’s leadership in the field of education. What leadership, Mr. Speaker? I understand the Premier said not long ago that one of his government’s problems was communication. Obviously there will be a bigger problem in communication than he ever realized, because students, teachers and parents throughout the province are seriously concerned about our education system at the present time.

Standards of learning and discipline in our schools have deteriorated badly. University professors have stated on many occasions that a large number of their new entrants cannot read or write English properly. And these are presumably among the best products of our secondary schools. What about the rest of our young people, those who weren’t advanced enough or interested enough to apply for university entrance? Is their ability to read and write English properly even more limited?

The government promises to further encourage home ownership so that Ontario families may continue to be the best housed in Canada. Mr. Speaker, housing shortages are reaching crisis proportions in our cities of the Province of Ontario. Since the new housing ministry was established in 1973 we have had three different housing ministers. All of them have promised miracles and delivered -- what?

We were told that in 1974 the provincial housing programmes would produce 31,100 housing starts. The produced less than half that amount -- 15,000 houses. The province signed an agreement with Central Mortgage and Housing for the neighbourhood improvement programme with a provincial commitment of $8.5 million for 1974. Actually only $3 million had been allocated to the programme when the estimates were presented to the Legislature. The Ontario home renewal plan was supposed to provide low-interest loans for home repairs to the extent of $10 million for the year 1974. Less than $1.5 million was actually made available.

On the subject of agriculture, Mr. Speaker, the government promised, “measures will be introduced to provide Ontario farmers with reasonable assurances of the profitable continuing operation of their vital enterprise.” I would strongly urge the government to take action in this connection as soon as possible. Our cash crop farmers enjoyed a moderately prosperous year in 1974, but unfortunately the indications are that 1975 will be a very different story indeed.

Inflation continues unchecked. The returns to producers are declining. For many years. our markets and prices have been largely dependent on crops and conditions in the US and in Canada only. But today developments in markets throughout the world have an effect on the situation in Canada.

Recently, the general public and the urban politicians have become increasingly concerned about the rising price of food. The people in the non-farming communities are taking an interest in food production and marketing practices. It is generally realized that farmers in Ontario are not responsible for this tremendous increase in the prices of food. Although high prices are being received for agriculture products, the costs of input for farmers are increasing at an alarming rate. Farm machinery has tripled in price; gasoline, hydro and other fuels have become very expensive. In fact, almost all farm supplies have greatly increased in price.

For example, urea fertilizer which was selling for $95 a ton in the spring of 1973 is now $240 a ton. Bulk ammonium nitrate was selling in 1973 at $69 a ton and at the present time is at $174 a ton, while diamonium phosphate, a common nitrogen fertilizer, climbed from $108 a ton to $240 a ton. A couple of seasons ago, twine was $5.95 a hale and is now $28 a bale.

During 1974, net farm income actually decreased by 23 per cent and a further decrease is anticipated in 1975. Many people consider that agriculture has never been more insecure or unstable than it is today because of the rising input costs and falling farm prices. It has been suggested that there is a great need for some kind of farm income protection plan.

Modern farming involves a very large amount of capital investment. In fact, it has been estimated that Ontario farm capital today is 42 per cent greater in constant dollar terms than in 1961, because this total capital investment is distributed among fewer farms. Investment per farm has increased by approximately 95 per cent and outstanding debts on commercial farms have almost doubled since 1961. Consequently, farmers have much higher overhead costs, including regular mortgage and loan repayments. In 1966 about 35 per cent of Ontario farmers were classed as part-time. In 1951 only about 27 per cent of Ontario farmers reported off-farm work. In 1966 the figure was 41 per cent. In 1971 the figure was 43 per cent. For most farmers the reason for off-farm work is economics -- a question, Mr. Speaker, of survival.

Many dairy farmers in Ontario are being forced out of business because of highly expensive labour and supplies. Our population is increasing while our dairy cattle are decreasing in numbers, with the inevitable effect on the price of milk. Hog farmers are finding that increased feed costs are causing them to go out of production, which will lead to a shortage of pork in a few years and subsequent increased prices to the consumer. Cow-calf operators are facing imminent financial disaster because of the low prices paid by the feeder operators and very strong pressures are being felt as a result of soaring prices of feed grain and other feeds.

Inflation is affecting food prices to a frightening degree. Many families are experiencing a very real hardship as a result. The housewife is worried about the future for her family. Every time she buys groceries she finds new price increases on basic necessities. Husbands who have to produce the funds to provide the food and the shelter are under increasing pressures daily and are worried about rising prices combined with rising unemployment.

Recently in the Globe and Mail, in an article of March 19, people read that a drop in beef prices to the farmers does not necessarily alter prices of beef to the consumer. Yet one year ago, when beef prices went up to an all-time high to the farmer, consumer prices soared as a result. Surely if the increase in prices to the farmers affects the consumer prices, a decrease should also result in a decrease to the consumer? I am acquainted with one farmer who is fattening over 600 steers at the present time. He tells me that with this tremendous increase in the cost of feeds, if the price of beef doesn’t increase considerably he will lose $50,000 this spring.

Two weeks ago I attended a meeting where the farmers discussed with the principal, vice-principal and the teachers of a district secondary school the possibilities of a delay in the opening of the secondary school until Sept. 15 next, so that the students could harvest the cash crops in the area, because the farmers have found that students are excellent helpers for harvesting. I understand the Minister of Education (Mr. Wells) has been contacted on this matter.

Mr. Speaker, this is a concern to the farmers across the Province of Ontario, to get experienced labour in order to harvest their crops. For some years now a number of farmers have been bringing in Mexican farm labour, but this year government officials have informed farmers that although previously Mexican workers were allowed to bring their families here, this year they can bring in only those who are 16 years old and over. Many people who have come here to work for a number of years on a regular basis are refusing to do so if they cannot bring all their family with them.

I would ask the Minister of Agriculture and Food (Mr. Stewart) if he would look into this situation and see what assistance can be given so that these Mexican workers will be able to work on our Ontario farms on a seasonal basis. It is to be hoped that the rather depressing prospects for Ontario agriculture will improve very soon.

There is a tremendous shortage of food throughout the world. Ontario farmers could make an important contribution to solving this very serious problem. However, their first-class farming abilities, combined with advanced technology, improved farm machinery and knowledge of the new fertilizers and pesticides, is not sufficient. There must be a strong and dynamic government measure to assist the agriculture industry to preserve our class 1 and class 2 farm land for agricultural purposes.

Low prices for farm products and increased costs of production provide little incentive for farmers to increase crop potential, no matter how great the need for food may be. On the other hand, very high prices for farm products obviously would stimulate much larger production per acre. The cost of land also influences production. Land valued at $2,000 to $3,000 per acre, or even more, is unlikely to be used for agriculture. Some people maintain there is little profit in growing field crops on land with a value greater than $500 an acre.

Marketing board figures for the tender fruit industry show the number of fruit growers selling through boards dropped to 1,498 last year from 1,596 the year before and more than 2,100 in 1969. More than two million acres were retired from farms in southwestern Ontario between the years 1951 and 1966, and it appears that the rate of loss has doubled from 1966 to the present day.

One of the greatest pressures on the fruit farmers in Niagara fruit land is the increasing price of land. The secretary-manager of the provincial marketing boards for grapes, asparagus and tender fruit has said that an acre of land worth between $3,000 and $4,000 to the fruit farmers is worth anywhere from $15,000 to $30,000 to other land buyers.

In all Ontario there are only 115.5 million arable acres. As a matter of interest, in the entire world there are only 7.86 billion acres potentially suitable for agriculture. According to the experts, for the first time surplus arable land is close to an end, especially with the population rising at a rate which would double in 30 years. This means productivity must be doubled in the same period if our present nutritional standards are to be maintained.

Dr. Norman Borlaug, an agronomist who received the Nobel Peace Prize for his contribution to the green revolution, has stated that although the contributions of the green revolution to increased food production are considerable and highly significant, they are nonetheless modest in comparison with the magnitude of present global needs.

For generations farmers have had a selfish interest in preserving land -- without it they would go out of business. The time has come when urban and suburban people everywhere must have a selfish interest in preserving land -- without it they would face a serious food shortage and their children and their children’s children would face a very real possibility of starvation.

The government must give top priority to establishing a land reserve for future generations by prohibiting premature and poorly planned development. We simply cannot afford to sit idly by, doing nothing, while our prime land continues to be consumed for other than agricultural purposes. It is a fact of life and economics that agriculture is limited to the use of the prime agricultural lands. Today, farmers cannot use marginal land economically and once our best agricultural land is paved over it cannot be reclaimed as farm land.

Land is our most valuable non-renewable commodity. We must husband our resources. They are not inexhaustible. Certainly, property owners have rights and they must be protected. However, our rights should be related to a type of stewardship which is in the interests of the community at large, both now and in the future. The province has plenty of room for houses, commerce, urban industry, recreation and agriculture. However, the people who will live here, say, 50 years from now will be happier, healthier and more prosperous if we give more thought than we have been giving to the question of which land should be used for which purposes.

In his status report on the Toronto-centred region in August, 1972, the Treasurer said:

“Land prices are escalating so rapidly that an increasing number of people are facing great difficulty in financing a home of their own. Alternatively, they are having to live a long distance away from their place of work and commute for several hours of the day.”

However, the government of which he is a member has made a practice in their so-called land planning of merely identifying land which is to be used, making that land more valuable to land speculators whose risks are reduced to a minimum. All they have to do is to hold on to the land and wait their opportunity when planning permission is given.

The Hellyer task force on housing and urban development in 1969 said, in relation to land speculation:

“There are several areas where the price of land has jumped up by 100 per cent in a relatively short space of time, and with no apparent change in the physical appearance the owners of the land reap gigantic financial benefits, not from improving or working it, merely by allowing it to lie fallow or in admitted under-use while the efforts of the community around it make such land an ever-increasing valuable asset.”

Far from attempting to prevent the destruction of our prime agricultural land, this government has contributed to the problem.

Land has been assembled for industrial parks; superhighways and hydro lines have slashed through valuable farm land. As my colleague, the member for Huron-Bruce, pointed out recently the government plans to expand facilities at the Bruce nuclear power plant. To provide hydro-electric power to the Toronto market will incur capital costs of millions of dollars and, worse, necessitate numerous and heavy transmission lines across prime agricultural land and scenic areas of southwestern Ontario. The so-called hearings merely went through the motions of obtaining public participation and discussion of these matters. Hydro bad already made the decision on which route was to be taken, and proceeded accordingly. The Bradley-Georgetown transmission route was more appropriate, and it would have been much more sensible to take any back-up line for Toronto via the Owen Sound-Collingwood area, linked with the already established Essa-Kleinburg corridor, would be served along that route.

Present Hydro plans would seem designed to cause the maximum damage to ecology and to destroy vital agricultural land, as well as upsetting property owners all along the line who are fighting desperately to prevent the line from going through.

In Kent county, Mr. Speaker, a special committee of property owners is fighting the proposed Hydro right of way takeover. The committee claims it has been pressured from the local Progressive Conservative Party to lay off the provincial Treasurer, according to a recent article in the Windsor Star.

This committee has called upon the Treasurer to explain why property owners are subjected to the agony and frustration, time and expense of an inquiry if elected MPPs and appointed ministers can, with their signatures, overrule all legal democratic procedures. The committee has also asked the Treasurer if all public hearings held in Ontario for government projects are “just a farce.” They asked: “Should not the general public object to this type of mock democracy?”

They also questioned the right of elected officials to be more powerful than the judicial system and questioned why property owners have been denied the right to appeal in government decisions approving the Hydro right of way.

The committee, composed of concerned property owners in Harwich, Raleigh and Tilbury townships, is organizing a public meeting at which the provincial government ministers will be asked to answer these and many other questions on Hydro’s plans for the future.

A spokesman for this committee stated that paramount on the agenda will be the Ontario Hydro report noting the proposed location of a nuclear power plant in the Kent county area in the year of 1990.

There is growing concern today that the government is not working in the best interests of the general public. The public wants to know why this is so. Incidentally, members of the opposition in the Legislature have been waiting to know the answer to this particular question for some time.

The decision of the minister to override the decision of the inquiry board held under the Fair Expropriations Act was described as a blow struck against the democratic system. This inquiry was held at a considerable expense to the taxpayers in general. It has been one of the longest inquiries held in Ontario, with all the cost being paid by the taxpayers.

The committee is asking if the public at large is aware of the chicanery that has taken place in Hydro’s southern Ontario region.

Inquiry officers were appointed by the provincial government to note whether the proposed expropriation of the Hydro right of way was sound, fair and reasonably necessary. The officers reported that Hydro’s taking of the land did not meet any of the requirements and, therefore, Hydro should not be permitted to construct a power line where it requested. In effect, he ruled that Hydro had not done its homework or studied the proper alternatives and therefore should not proceed to build this transmission line. On Sept. 10, 1974, the Treasurer gave the property owners affected 24 hours notice to attend a general meeting at a place called Merlin to hear the report of the inquiry. The report was in Hydro’s favour and it was at this time that the government overruled the decision of the inquiry officer. Mr. Speaker, is this the action of a democratic government?

Mrs. M. Campbell (St. George): No way.

Mr. Spence: Not only is the method of operation of the government in connection with these proposed Hydro corridors open to the gravest criticism, even those loyal supporters of the Conservative Party who may feel their actions can be defended because the end justifies the means, must be assailed by doubt when they hear that the Ontario Energy Board had called for a slowdown in the Ontario Hydro rush to build nuclear power stations.

Ontario Hydro owns fixed assets worth about $6 billion and proposed spending for the period from 1974 to 1986 is $30.9 billion. I understand the total proposed for the years 1977 to 1982 is $8.7 billion, of which only $1.3 billion is for transmission and distribution facilities. The balance of $7.4 billion is scheduled to be spent to expand Hydro’s operating capacity. The overall needs for the entire province today are between 12,000 and 13,000 megawatts and the government-planned hydro corridors have a potential of 60,000 to 80,000 megawatts.

On the other hand Hydro chairman Robert Taylor has warned that the rate increase for hydro will be considerably higher in 1976 than that put into effect in January of this year. It has been strongly rumoured that the rates will go up 100 per cent in the next five years alone.

Mr. Speaker, in these days of recession and inflation is it fair and reasonable for Ontario Hydro to charge unwarranted high rates to pay for the vast expansion of facilities when the former Minister of Energy (Mr. McKeough) has indicated that the short-term security of the system is more than adequate?

The government promised in its Speech from the Throne that as a safeguard against the growing complexity of government and its relationship with the individual citizens the government will establish the office of a provincial ombudsman, or an ombudsperson, to ensure the protection of our citizens against arbitrary judgements or practices. What could be more arbitrary than overruling the decision of an inquiry officer on the Hydro corridor? What could be more arbitrary and autocratic than this government’s whole attitude, and that of Hydro, in connection with their hydro lines?

As to the proposal to establish the office of a provincial ombudsman, my colleague the hon. member for Downsview (Mr. Singer) has been prodding the government to take this action for years. In every session for the past nine or 10 years he has presented a private member’s bill to this effect. Now, finally, the government is prepared to do something about his proposal; finally, when on every side the evidence is building up to show it that its days are coming close to an end.

Mr. Speaker, if this Throne Speech is any indication of the kind of legislation, the kind of action in the face of adversity, we are to witness from this government in the difficult days ahead which it has promised us, obviously this government is going to go out with a bang. An hon. member of the government recently chose to liken a member of the Liberal caucus to some form of an Australian lizard. Mr. Speaker, I would have thought such childish talk was beneath the dignity of a minister of the Crown but doubtless my standards are a little old-fashioned. If I were the kind of person to descend to his level I would say this government would soon go out, not like a lion but like a whipped dog, with its tail between its legs; but I shall not make such a comparison.

Mr. Speaker, that winds up my speech. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker: The hon. member for Nickel Belt.

Mr. F. Laughren (Nickel Belt): Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I thought the previous speaker’s remarks contained some wisdom -- particularly his closing words -- and I would like to associate myself with them. Strangely enough, the previous member from the Liberal Party who spoke also said some things that made sense and it is clear to me --

Mr. J. R. Breithaupt (Kitchener): It’s getting better.

Mr. Laughren: Did I say “strangely”?

Mr. Breithaupt: It’s getting better.

Mr. Laughren: No, it’s not getting better. Since I’ve been clown here, Mr. Speaker, in 3½ years I’ve noticed that the members from beyond Metropolitan Toronto play a major role in the debates of this Legislature. I know they constitute only whatever 117 minus 26 is; I’m always struck by the number of out-of-town members who are in this chamber during the evening sittings. I think the people of Ontario are well served by the members who are spread far and wide across this province.

Mr. Speaker, in your position as Speaker of this chamber, I hope you will address yourself to some of the problems of the members of this Legislature in the session to come. The Camp commission recommendations not only will not solve all the problems but the way they will be implemented will not solve all the problems either.

I know, for example, for the members who represent very large ridings -- such as I and the member for Thunder Bay; and members of the government as well -- it is much more difficult for us to represent our constituents than it is for someone in Metropolitan Toronto whose constituents can pick up the phone and phone directly to Queen’s Park. That is not possible for us.

Mr. Roy: It’s not possible from Ottawa either.

Mr. Laughren: I know, as a member who drives in the neighbourhood of 40,000 miles a year, if one puts that in terms of hours on the road and translates those hours into weeks, one can see the kind of time some of us spend in our automobiles. That is not very productive time.

I think there is a great need for constituency offices, particularly in ridings outside Metropolitan Toronto. I do not believe our constituents are best served by the paltry saving effected by our not having constituency offices. I believe if we had constituency offices we would be able to deal more effectively more often and in more depth with the issues of the day as opposed to individual constituents’ problems.

That is where some of us spend an inordinate amount of time but I think members would agree that we cannot ignore the constituents who are having problems. On the other hand, I don’t believe our constituencies as a whole are best served by members spending their time doing that. As a member who represents a highly industrialized area, mainly consisting of mining and lumbering, there is an extremely high number of compensation and unemployment insurance problems which I have to handle occasionally, as well as a large number of problems associated with seasonal employment and with the high rate of injuries. I think that there is a great need for constituency offices and I hope that the government will address itself to that problem in the coming session.

While I’m talking about other members’ contributions to the Throne Speech, Mr. Speaker, I was here when the member for Algoma-Manitoulin (Mr. Lane) spoke, and I was struck by how terribly defensive he was about what had happened in Elliot Lake, about his role in what had happened in Elliot Lake and about the fact that the workers in Elliot Lake looked not toward their sifting member for assistance or for a voice here at Queen’s Park but to members of the New Democratic Party.

Mr. Speaker, that kind of recognition did not come easily to members of the NDP. It came because of our concern about the kind of workmen’s compensation system we’ve got in this province and because of our identification with the trade union movement in this province. That is something that we work very hard at, and there is nothing wrong with the workers at Elliot Lake realizing that if they are going to have a voice here at Queen’s Park, they must turn to the NDP. After all, it is the government that is the architect of their misfortune -- and no one else. As a matter of fact, Mr. Speaker --

Hon. Mr. Winkler: I invite the member to come and spend a weekend with me.

Mr. P. Taylor: That would be a lost weekend.

Mr. Laughren: Well, perhaps the minister could ask the member for Algoma-Manitoulin to spend a weekend in Elliot Lake --

Hon. Mr. Wilder: Why not? I’d be delighted.

Mr. Laughren: Mr. Speaker, when those terrifying statistics were coming to light in Elliot Lake and when they were being debated in the standing committee on resource development, the member for Algoma-Manitoulin never showed his face in the committee and never spoke during the debate here in the Legislature either. That is not showing concern for his constituents, and the people in Elliot Lake are very cognizant about that.

Hon. Mr. Winkler: The member for Algoma-Manitoulin is a high-class member. Don’t deny it.

Mr. Laughren: Yes, well --

Hon. Mr. Grossman: A very hard-working member.

Mr. Laughren: Why is it then that the workers in Elliot Lake still have not received justice for what’s been done to them? And why is it that the Minister of Natural Resources continues to look the other way when the health of the working people of this province is jeopardized?

Mr. J. Lane (Algoma-Manitoulin): The member knows darn well that things are happening in Elliot Lake.

Mr. Laughren: Yes, and I know why they are happening too; no thanks to the member for Algoma-Manitoulin and no thanks to the Minister of Natural Resources.

Mr. Lane: No thanks to the member for Nickel Belt.

Mr. Laughren: Mr. Speaker, if there is one minister of the Crown who has not earned the right to continue to be a minister, it’s the Minister of Natural Resources --

Hon. Mr. Winkler: That is very unfair; a real unfair and unjust remark.

Hon. Mr. Grossman: Besides, it is political.

Mr. B. Gilbertson (Algoma): He is trying to make a little political hay.

Mr. Laughren: I am glad that the Provincial Secretary for Resources Development is here, because, Mr. Speaker --

Mr. Havrot: The member is in trouble in his own riding.

Mr. Roy: The House leader should look at himself closer in the mirror tomorrow morning when he is shaving.

Mr. Laughren: The Minister of Natural Resources regards the working people in the mining community -- the workers in the mines, as he does the resource; something that’s to be exploited. That is the reason I say --

Hon. Mr. Winkler: That is a very unfair statement. He is one of them and the member knows it.

Mr. Laughren: He is one of the miners?

Hon. Mr. Winkler: Yes.

Mr. Jessiman: Is that the same as school teachers from Nickel Belt being on leave of absence?

Mr. Laughren: Mr. Speaker, if I could correct the member for Fort William, the member for Nickel Belt does not have a leave of absence from his job. As a matter of fact, maybe that is something I should talk to you about, Mr. Speaker. Did you know that of the different levels of education in this province -- elementary, secondary, the community college system, the university system -- of those four, only one group of teachers does not have an automatic leave of absence when its members serve in this Legislature and that is the community college teachers. There’s the man I should be talking to, the government House leader.

Mr. Roy: Don’t talk to him about that; that is policy.

Mr. Laughren: That is discrimination against the people in our community colleges.

Mr. Speaker: Order, please, I wonder if the --

Mr. Stokes: What is the member for Fort William on leave from?

Mr. Roy: He is on leave from the ONR.

Mr. Speaker: Order, please. In view of the hour, would the member like to move the adjournment of the debate?

Mr. Laughren: Mr. Speaker, if I could just make one concluding remark, I would say that it is nice to see the member for Fort William on leave from his usual activities, whatever they might be in this province.

Mr. Laughren moves the adjournment of the debate.

Motion agreed to.

Hon. Mr. Winkler moves that the House sit tomorrow at 10 a.m. to continue the debate on the Speech from the Throne and that the standing social development committee be authorized to sit concurrently with the House for its consideration of Bill 4, An Act to amend the Child Welfare Act.

Hon. Mr. Winkler: Mr. Speaker, before you call the motion, we have agreement on the point, but I think it should be on the record, that in the course of the debate tomorrow morning certain rules of the House will be suspended. There will be no quorum calls or divisions. The House will rise at 12:30 for lunch and resume for ordinary business at 2 o’clock.

Motion agreed to.

Mr. Speaker: It is my understanding, and I have been asked to announce to the House, that the social development committee will meet in committee room 1 at 10:30 tomorrow morning to consider Bill 4.

Hon. Mr. Winkler moves the adjournment of the House.

Motion agreed to.

The House adjourned at 10:30 o’clock p.m.