The House resumed at 8 p.m.

RESIDENTIAL PREMISES RENT REVIEW AMENDMENT ACT (CONTINUED)

Mr. Deputy Chairman: Any comments, questions or amendments to any section?

Mr. Deans: Mr. Chairman, I rise on a point of order. I had handed to me some 45 minutes ago, over the signature of the government House leader, a letter that says as follows:

“I am authorized to indicate that the government views protection for Ontario tenants, as embodied in the rent control legislation to be considered tonight by the committee of the whole House, as a matter of extreme importance to the government programme.

“Any failure to pass this legislation before May 1 by the Legislature, or any passage of an amendment lowering the guideline, would be an expression of a serious lack of confidence in the economic and social programme of the government, which the government would take very seriously indeed.

“The lowering of the guideline to six per cent from eight per cent would almost certainly cause many more landlord appeals, which would result in higher rents being paid by many, due to rising costs which could be shown during the appeal process. Incentives to further rental construction would be severely limited at a time when further rental construction is both needed and helpful to job creation in Ontario.”

Mr. Chairman, my point of order is this. Not 24 hours ago we were asked by the government to agree to suspend the normal rules and to move to bills in order that passage could be obtained for this legislation, and we agreed.

Mr. Sweeney: It is what they call a double-cross.

Mr. Deans: We understood it was important to the tenants and the landlords of the province that, prior to May 1, there be legislation in force that would clearly set out the limits within which they should operate. What I do feel, sir, is that it would have been honourable, to say the least, had the government placed before us in addition to its request, its intention to consider the matter one of confidence.

Mr. Conway: Without honour -- without honour.

Mr. Deans: I want to say to you, sir, that this party, having put before the government, on numerous occasions over a number of weeks, its intention to move to six per cent from eight per cent, doesn’t intend to be intimidated by the government’s views. We don’t intend to allow this to interfere with what we consider to be the proper legislative processes, which allows the members of the --

Hon. Mr. Bennett: Point of order?

Hon. Mr. Handleman: What is your point of order?

Hon. Mr. Meen: Point of order?

Mr. Deans: -- Legislature to hear the debate on the matter and to come to conclusions at that time. We consider the government’s motion and intention to be frivolous.

Hon. Mr. Welch: Mr. Chairman, I feel some obligation -- notwithstanding the fact that I haven’t heard the point of order -- to put on the record the events that have happened since yesterday. It is obvious, for reasons shared by all the members of this House, that it is necessary to put this particular legislation in place before the end of the month -- before May 1.

Mr. Lewis: It is necessary for your silliness, your political silliness --

Hon. Mr. Welch: The point is that we were carrying on in the spirit --

Mr. Warner: It is transparent.

Mr. Lewis: Goodness -- grown men and women.

Hon. Mr. Welch: -- of consultation. There was, in fact, consultation as to whether or not we could proceed with this particular legislation this evening. To suggest some other procedure should have been followed is beyond my comprehension, because that’s exactly what we’ve been doing ever since the election of October 1975 -- in the spirit of consultation.

Mr. Davidson: Who wrote the letter?

Mr. Warner: It is your letter.

Hon. Mr. Welch: The question came up at noon hour today. The House leaders meet every Thursday at noon. The question was raised at that particular time as to the attitude and I indicated the matter was being reviewed and was being considered. At 4:30 this afternoon I indicated to the leaders I would like an opportunity to meet with them, and at 6 I suggested we could discuss it at 7 o’clock.

To suggest to the House that there hasn’t been reporting and consultation in this matter is, I think, a very unfortunate impression to leave; notwithstanding the fact that I still don’t know just exactly what point of order I am speaking to. I don’t see the point of order.

Mr. Warner: Shame.

Mr. Deputy Chairman: Order, please. The bill has been referred to the committee for consideration. It is in proper form. I suggest we go ahead with debate on the clause by clause.

Mr. Breithaupt: Before that matter happened, Mr. Chairman, I did not have the full opportunity to hear the comments that went back and forth across the floor. However, I understand, having been somewhat involved with the situation, that my friend the member for Wentworth commented upon the efficacy of having --

[Applause.]

Mr. Lewis: Can we touch your garments? You should cross the floor.

Mr. Givens: The Messiah has come!

Mr. Good: It’s the first time the Premier has been here for three days.

Mr. Deputy Chairman: Order, please. The hon. member for Kitchener has the floor.

Hon. Mr. Davis: The Leader of the Opposition did touch my garments.

Mr. Breithaupt: Mr. Chairman, could we have these two people seated, please?

Interjections.

Mr. Deputy Chairman: Order, please.

Mr. Breithaupt: As I said before I was so rudely interrupted, the efficacy of this letter has been discussed across the floor. It is clear that on consent, discussed by the House leaders and by various members of the caucuses, it was agreed that the House would go into committee of the whole to deal with this bill, and that was done some moments before 6 o’clock this evening. Whether a certain letter has been received, with contents that may or may not influence the results of government decisions after the committee deals with a certain bill in a certain way, is I should think of no particular consequence at this point in that we have agreed to go ahead with dealing with a certain bill.

Now then, Mr. Chairman, I too have received a certain letter.

Mr. Reid: “Dear Jim,” it says.

Mr. Breithaupt: I was even apprised of certain other comments made, and I viewed various copies of the letter that the press had on hand when I happened to be approached a few moments before 8 o’clock.

Mr. Nixon: Dictated by Lester Davis.

Mr. Breithaupt: The end result, of course, is that we have received a certain letter which advises us as to attitudes which may or may not be taken as the debate on a certain bill proceeds. We have received the letter and we shall deal with the bill as we think best.

Interjections.

Mr. Deputy Chairman: Order, please. We are considering Bill 28. Are there any comments, questions or amendments to any section? If so, to which section?

Mr. Lewis: It has a very insidious effect on the speech habits over here.

On section 1:

Mr. Chairman: Mr. Breaugh moves that section 1 of Bill 28 be amended by changing the number “eight,” where it appears in subsection 1, to the number “six.”

Mr. Breaugh: In discussing the bill, we have dealt with this bill in principle and covered the majority of the problems that deal with the rent review legislation in the province of Ontario. The amendment we are proposing now deals with the very crux of the matter. In the second year of a programme designed by the federal government, to which this rent review programme is closely attached if not inseparably identified, there is this problem of everything else in the public and private sector being controlled at this level.

Without embracing a programme we do not like, we simply want to recognize very simply the numbers that are involved, because they are the important things. We are not given to long diatribes about what programmes we ought to attach ourselves to or what the federal government is doing. We want to address ourselves very directly to the concept of eight per cent or six per cent, and so our amendment is worded directly in that way.

We believe that if people have had their wages controlled to a six per cent level, and if other aspects of the economy that are controlled in that manner supposedly are controlled at that level, very simply the rents ought also to be set at that level.

As members of this House, we had presented to us this afternoon, and they were presented previously, a series of numbers that might indicate a higher level would be justified.

Hon. Mr. Handleman: Last week, not this afternoon.

Mr. Breaugh: Oddly enough, it is a level which the government proposes in this particular legislation.

I want to point out to the members of this House that those numbers are, I think, presented in isolation; they do not reflect similar findings or similar studies done in other jurisdictions. Whatever numbers game anyone would care to play, the plain fact for tenants is very simply that you can’t control their wages at one level and their rents at another. If you are entering into the kind of controlled economy that we are purporting to live in these days, then we ask for, at least, a measure of fairness.

We are going to propose -- as we said in discussing this bill in principle -- a number of items, a number of amendments that are substantive. We do not intend to spend a good deal of the House’s time this evening dealing with whether we have used the proper wording or whether we have got the right “t” crossed. We want to deal substantively with the rent review programme in essence. We want to set a realistic figure in this particular subsection of six per cent; in other jurisdictions, like British Columbia or Quebec, it has been set at a lower level than this government proposes.

Hon. Mr. Handleman: There is no guideline in Quebec.

Mr. Breaugh: One small irony that you might want to take note of is that in preparing its cost estimates -- the ones that were distributed to the members of the House this afternoon -- the government almost doubled the amount allowed for administrative costs, almost doubled the amount it previously gave its own rent review officers; in the rent review officers’ manual they indicate that five per cent is a sufficient amount of allocation for administrative costs. Yet you find in the material distributed this afternoon, that it has jumped to nine per cent.

Mr. Conway: Sorcerers.

Mr. Warner: Shame.

Mr. Breaugh: We find that to be an inconsistent position for the government to take. We also find the numbers -- the justification, for the eight per cent -- to be insufficient; that does not stand up. I suppose that one could argue that next winter will be a very cold winter.

Mr. Grossman: For you it sure will.

Mr. Breaugh: But that’s hardly fact just yet and hardly the basis for it. What we are proposing with our amendments is a rent review process that works and works well, that allows those people who want to go through the rent review process to have a full hearing; not to do it several times during the year, but to do it once; to clean up some of the obvious problems that have been found in the rent review legislation that now exists.

We think, Mr. Chairman, that a very basic premise for that is the guideline that is set. What we are saying is that it is a guideline, not a finite number; that the guideline ought to be a base number with which there is no argument from either side. That poses, in our view, that the guideline ought to set at the lower limit. That way we can handle a rent review process that is fair, that allows actual cost pass-throughs to be passed through; there is very little opposition in any quarter as to that being an agreeable and acceptable concept in rent review legislation. If there are actual costs -- not projections, not magic numbers pulled out of a hat -- they will be handled by the review process; which as I understand it is the reason we adopted a reviewing process, to have a fair hearing, to hear both sides of the argument, to look at the facts; to accept, if something is realistic and can be clearly established, that it be passed through.

In my experiences with rent review in the province of Ontario, everyone accepts that notion. What we are proposing in this specific amendment is the guideline.

What should it be? It is our estimation that six per cent is slightly high but it is a fair one. According to our calculations on what the guidelines should be, you could actually say that it could be 5.38 per cent, it could go that low; and you might take your projection up to 5.92 per cent. But, certainly, if you adopted a six per cent guideline that would be fair and adequate as a basis for rent review legislation in the province of Ontario. If costs actually go over that amount, you have the rent review process.

After all, we have the process in place and the government is not discarding the review concept. What we are saying is that since you have a base guideline that is there, that’s acceptable to all concerned and realistic, then past that point you go to a review process where you analyse actual costs, where both sides have an opportunity to present their case; and that the review process itself is fair and workable.

We will propose four other amendments this evening, amendments that we think will clarify the reviewing process itself, will make it more fair both for landlords and tenants, and will account for anything that might be above the six per cent number.

[8:15]

In summary, Mr. Chairman, I want to put to you that if we are accepting, in the province of Ontario, that you have first and foremost a guideline presented, it ought to be a base guideline, and six per cent is a fair and equitable number to use and that is precisely what we have put. It’s not jumping in bed with anything else, or complicating the issue with a long unsubstantiated set of numbers, but saying very straight that you want a base guideline and that above that guideline you deal with it in an effective review mechanism, which we are also proposing and certainly support, and that actual cost pass-throughs are certainly acceptable on both sides of the question but that you need an effective review mechanism to make that work.

That’s what we support. We will support that continuously throughout this particular debate. Our amendments will be addressed specifically to make that an effective mechanism and the argument now is very straight and very simple: that your guideline number should be a base number, that it should be a realistic one and should not be inflated. In every other jurisdiction we have looked in, specifically in terms of British Columbia where a rather serious study was done, six per cent is a reasonable base guideline. If you go above that, you run through the review process and that is fair and we accept and support that notion.

But I want to put to the House very clearly that we do not support any jacking around with this particular scheme, any manipulation of numbers, any very complicated thing, because it is a very simple issue. It is a very simple issue of establishing a base guideline of six per cent, which is a fair base guideline, and above that you use the review process as the entire legislation is designed to do. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. Deputy Chairman: The hon. member for Perth (Mr. Edighoffer).

Mr. Shore: Where is the member for London Centre (Mr. Peterson), a specialist in housing?

Mr. Breithaupt: He is off doing good works.

Mr. Deputy Chairman: Order. Order, please.

Perhaps before I recognize the hon. member, does the minister wish to respond to the --

Hon. Mr. Handleman: Yes I do, if I may. I listened with some interest to the hon. member both during second reading and again tonight and I heard him refer to other jurisdictions that he has looked at. I don’t know of a single jurisdiction that has a six per cent guideline. Perhaps he would enlighten us. He has a chance to speak again on this.

The jurisdictions to the west of us have 10 and nine; the jurisdiction to the east of us has no guideline, it’s a completely tenant-initiated programme. The tenant can appeal any increase, as under ours. We have given you figures and the hon. member has confused, again, what we are telling our rent review officers in the bulletins -- the five per cent that it refers to is not an inflation factor. It’s not an inflation factor. The factor we have given you is 20 for administrative costs, as an inflation factor not a portion of rent. I think he should learn to read figures, Mr. Chairman. But again --

Interjection.

Hon. Mr. Handleman: -- the member said that everything in the private and the public sector is six per cent. Well municipal taxes are going up 13.

Ms. Gigantes: Congratulations.

Hon. Mr. Handleman: Maintenance and repairs, 10. And I could go on and on. There isn’t a single one that’s under 10 per cent.

Mr. Warner: You are responsible.

Mr. Davidson: Your government is doing it.

Hon. Mr. Handleman: Now, the hon. member is suggesting that he has taken six per cent because --

Mr. Martel: Except wages.

Mr. Shore: The member for Scarborough-Ellesmere would do better in public accounts if he kept quiet.

Hon. Mr. Handleman: He has picked out of the anti-inflation guidelines a figure of six per cent, which relates to wages, and he wants to make this programme, which is a cost-through programme, rental according to income. It never has been that. It’s not intended to be that and the government will oppose this amendment with every force that we have.

[Applause.]

Mr. Chairman: The hon. member for Perth has the floor.

Interjections.

Mr. Grossman: Think it over, Hughie.

Hon. Mr. Rhodes: In the churches, on the streets, in the schools.

Some hon. members: That’s scary!

Interjections.

Mr. Chairman: The hon. minister has completed his remarks.

Mr. Breithaupt: We had hoped so, Mr. Chairman.

An hon. member: We oppose them.

Mr. Chairman: The hon. member for Perth will continue uninterrupted.

Mr. Edighoffer: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. First of all I have given, I believe, sufficient notice to the Chair, to the minister and to the opposition critic that I wish to place an amendment as well. I wondered if I could have a little guidance from the Chair whether I should wait and place that after this first amendment has been dealt with, or should I place it as a subamendment?

Mr. Chairman: Is it an amendment or an amendment to the amendment?

Mr. Breithaupt: It is an amendment.

Mrs. Campbell: It is a different amendment.

Interjections.

Mr. Chairman: You may place it now, but if it doesn’t have the effect of amending the original amendment, we will have to deal with them individually.

Mr. Breithaupt: Mr. Chairman, if I might speak to that particular item, it would be our view that the amendment which we are placing is to some extent dealing, of course, with the particular, same situation. We would ask the concurrence of the Chair to deal with the first amendment and then to deal with the second amendment, so that we would have the approach that has been used in this House a number of times to otherwise avoid the passage of a section once the first amendment might have been rejected.

Hon. Mr. Handleman: If I might speak on that point, Mr. Chairman, we would agree entirely with the member for Kitchener that that’s the procedure we would like to see followed.

Mr. Chairman: Agreed?

Some hon. members: Agreed.

Mr. Chairman: All right. Is there any further discussion on the amendment proposed by the member for Oshawa?

Mr. Edighoffer: I would just like to say very briefly that, of course, we realize what this amendment will do in effect. We in this caucus have decided there is another method that would be much more satisfactory to amending this legislation. Therefore, we in this party would not be able to support the amendment which simply replaces the figure “six” for the figure “eight.”

Mr. Chairman: Is there any further discussion on the amendment?

Mr. Lewis: Mr. Chairman, I’d like to use --

(Applause.)

Mr. Breithaupt: They really have to be better trained than that.

Mr. Lewis: That’s the problem when there’s no cultist tendencies in the party. But I am pleased to rise on the last night of this Parliament to participate in this debate --

Mr. Breithaupt: Don’t presume too much. You may be here for a long time yet.

Mr. Lewis: This evening, but not much beyond.

Mr. Breithaupt: Perhaps tomorrow? Or for several other days?

Mr. Bain: That depends on the Premier.

Mr. Lewis: Mr. Chairman, further to the reference at the outset to the letter from the government House leader, which places this debate in a particular context, frankly it appears to us as simply silly.

Mr. Chairman: You must deal specifically with the amendment proposed by the member for Oshawa.

Mr. Lewis: I am doing that; and I’m saying, Mr. Chairman --

Mr. Chairman: I’m listening very carefully.

Mr. Lewis: You always do, sir.

Hon. Mr. Welch: We shared information all through this Parliament.

Mr. Lewis: If you need a rationale it can’t be this flimsy, my friend. It’s got to be better than that.

Mr. Chairman: That’s not at issue.

Interjections.

Mr. Chairman: Order. That’s not at issue. We’re dealing specifically with the amendment proposed by the member for Oshawa which would change Oshawa, section 1 of Bill 28.

Mr. Lewis: Yes, Mr. Chairman.

Hon. Mr. Davis: Which one are you smiling at?

Mr. Lewis: I think everyone views this whole procedure as government by shenanigans. However, I will address myself to the section.

We have moved the amendment to bring the rate of increase to six per cent as an extension of the position that we have put on behalf of those who are tenants in Ontario, we felt legitimately, for a considerable period of time; while still and always feeling that the position of the developer and owner is protected: (a) by virtue of the six per cent being fair and (b) by virtue of the review process to which every owner and every tenant is entitled to turn.

What is emerging here during the course of the --

Interjection.

Mr. Lewis: Pardon? The same is true of eight per cent.

Hon. Mr. Davis: You don’t understand --

Mr. Chairman: I will recognize the Premier next if he wants to engage in the debate.

Mr. Breithaupt: If he can get the Chairman’s eye.

Mr. Lewis: Please, Mr. Chairman. be more deferential towards the Premier. Me, you can abuse.

May I say to the House that what is emerging here tonight, in the debate which is taking place on the motion put by my colleague from Oshawa, is obviously that some of us would wish the six per cent to be instituted immediately -- that is, effective on August 1 next, I guess -- and some would wish to have it effective 10 weeks after that, on October 14 next. That’s essentially what it’s about, and this clause speaks to the validity of the six per cent being applied now.

I say to the minister that we have not in any sense been entirely ensnared by the question of the AIB and the guidelines. There may be a rationale for tying it to a figure under which most of Ontario now works and receives wages, which will be in the range of six per cent if you fall in the AIB programme. But there are separate and independent arguments and rationale which we want to put to the House in the strongest possible spirit. The figures which were presented to the Legislature by the Minister of Consumer and Commercial Relations say that the inflation factor for landlords amounts to 8.65 per cent, the net impact on the rent increase is 8.65 per cent.

He says that the total operating costs represent 55 per cent of all costs. The net impact on the rent would be 8.65 per cent and that presumably is why he has chosen eight per cent at this point in time; and in the process he estimates cost attributions related to municipal taxes, maintenance and repairs, administrative costs, fuel costs, electricity and water costs, and he adds them all together and says they represent 55 per cent of total operating costs. Then he introduces a number of inflation factors and comes out at the other end with a figure of 8.65 per cent as the net impact on rent increases.

We take serious exception to two of his specific designations. For administrative costs, he says that they assume nine per cent now of the proportion of rent and he will apply an inflation factor of 20 per cent. We point out that regularly at his own rent review hearings, the portion of rent allowed by virtue of administrative costs is five per cent. That’s all that it’s allowed. That’s what happens at rent review hearings. Surely you know that. Already you have inflated the original figure almost double, and therefore your inflation factor is completely without foundation.

So this is what we have done. We have cut it in half. We are allowing an inflation factor of 10 per cent because you have doubled the legitimate percentage proportion of administrative costs.

Now the second point: You have put in for fuel costs an inflation factor of some 30 per cent. You have done it on the basis of alleged volume over the winter months. You have done it on the basis of increases in oil and natural gas, which are really quite astronomical for a government which digs its heels in so firmly against increases. For people who say they will allow no increases, the government has computed 20 per cent in for the next year. It can’t have it both ways. If Jim Taylor is going to get up in this Legislature, Mr. Chairman, and beat his breast about standing firm against the west and Ottawa, there is a slight inconsistency in assuming a 20 per cent capitulation off the bat. What’s wrong with you? What’s wrong with you?

Mr. Chairman, that trifle aside, that gap in logic aside, I say with respect to the Minister of Consumer and Commercial Relations that the 30 per cent is ridiculous. Even in terms of a cold winter next year approximating this one -- and God knows this one was the coldest in how long? I think 340 recorded years or something -- as a matter of fact it pre-dates the Tories, which says something.

Mr. Conway: But only just.

Mr. Breithaupt: They haven’t been in power that long surely.

Mr. Lewis: May I say that even including major increases -- we are not going to vary it by much -- we are suggesting to you an inflation factor of 20 per cent rather than 30 per cent as being far more realistic. That would make slight alterations in the net impact on rent which you have calculated at 8.65.

But let me tell you, Mr. Minister, where we really take issue with you. When you have added up all these designated areas of cost attribution, you say that represents total operating costs approximating 55 per cent. Fifty-five per cent of total operating costs are covered by municipal taxes, maintenance and repairs, administrative costs, fuel costs, electricity and water costs.

Let me read to you from the report on rents done in British Columbia, which you never did, where they examined --

Interjection.

Mr. Lewis: Just a second now. They examined 198 rental projects. Let me read you the finding of the report: “The average apartment building uses 46.2 per cent of its revenue to pay for its operating expenses, inclusive of municipal taxes.”

[8:30]

Mr. Shore: Because the rents are higher.

Mr. Lewis: “The remaining 53.8 per cent represents the owner’s return and includes the money used to pay off the mortgages.” In other words --

Mr. Shore: In other words, the rents are higher.

Mr. Lewis: -- in BC it’s 46 per cent, but in Ontario you calculate 55 per cent.

Mr. Shore: What about the heating out there?

Mr. Lewis: Just a moment.

Mr. Chairman: Will the member for London North please try to restrain himself.

Mr. Lewis: Mr. Chairman, he was far more effective from this side than he is from that side.

I want to make the other point. If you reject the 46 per cent figure, we then went to the CMHC today and we asked them, how much do you tabulate for operating costs as a percentage of total cost for private or public projects in the province of Ontario? You know what they said? An upper limit of 45 per cent and a lower limit of 42 per cent. How is it that the only study on record shows 46 per cent, and Central Mortgage and Housing Corporation says 42 per cent to 45 per cent, including a whole range of private and public projects in Ontario, and you designate 55 per cent? I’ll tell you why; because you’re inflating your figures in order to justify an illegitimate level, that’s what it’s all about.

Let me say through the Chair, respectfully to the minister, that if you take the figures which are acceptable to CMHC and are obviously authenticated by other studies, and you apply them to the figures you’ve used for proportion of rent to a realistic inflation factor, you know what you come out with? My colleague from Oshawa said it, you come out with a net impact on rent increases of 5.3 per cent or 5.9 per cent, somewhere in that area; in other words the six per cent covering it quite adequately.

That’s why, in every sense, on the basis of I think legitimate analysis and legitimate information, we feel it should be six per cent now. I suspect, Mr. Premier, through the Chair, we’re not going to receive support for this in the House tonight. The government, when it is defeated, will probably be defeated on a motion which says we should delay the six per cent by 10 weeks. We’re not people to cavil, we want to point out to the minister opposite that there is a rationale now in the province of Ontario to go to six per cent, to give the tenants that protection.

May I say, Mr. Minister, that your observation about what the landlords will do are not generously welcomed on this side of the House. The landlords have the right to go to rent review, yes, and believe me if they weren’t satisfied with eight per cent now they’d be going. And if they can justify more than six per cent they still have the right to go, no one denies that. You shouldn’t be inviting them to turn on the tenants of Ontario if we reduce it to six per cent tonight, and that’s what you’re doing.

Hon. Mr. Handleman: Come on.

Hon. Mr. Taylor: Shame.

Mr. Lewis: There’s no need for that, it’s in the legislation.

Mr. Nixon: You’re giving them an argument that pre-judges the decision. You certainly are.

Mr. Lewis: That’s right, you are prejudging. As a matter of fact, the member for Brant-Oxford-Norfolk makes a good point, because you’re almost signalling to your rent review officers what you want found when cases come before them, and that prejudices the legislation.

Mr. S. Smith: Exactly.

Mr. Nixon: They will be quoting you.

Mr. Lewis: But it was pointed out in an interjection by the leader of the Liberal Party the other day that you’ve allowed, in your own legislation, the right to revise downwards the eight per cent. Sure; you’ve allowed it in this legislation. Why would you do that? Is it the hobgoblin of Sidney Handleman’s mind? No. Is it perhaps the strategy of the government? Yes.

Mr. Breithaupt: It’s not that small.

Mr. Lewis: What we would like to do is do it for you. As a matter of fact, we’d like to do it in advance of the epic event that is coming rather than have it done at some future occasion. It’s fairly straightforward. The six per cent is legitimized now and there’s no reason in the world why it shouldn’t be sustained now.

For all those reasons, for making rent review work -- and we are going to provide some amendments -- we would like this House to accept the six per cent at this moment and to conduct the debate in good faith on the basis of the figures before us, as I think we’ve tried to indicate to you, and based on the information we have. For heaven’s sake, it’s not a major departure to set a level which can be justified and useful for the tenants of Ontario in allowing avenues of review.

If I may add as an addendum as I sit down, Mr. Chairman, to turn the difference between eight per cent and six per cent into a matter of confidence, frankly, is ludicrous and unworthy of a debate of this importance.

Hon. Mr. Davis: Mr. Chairman --

Mr. Ruston: He’s coming out of the bullpen. John Hiller is coming in now.

Hon. Mr. Davis: Listen, Mr. Hiller had not a bad record, if memory serves me correctly. You would know that.

Mr. Ruston: He was in my club.

Hon. Mr. Davis: Mr. Chairman, I am doing my very best not to be provoked --

Mr. Breithaupt: Or provocative.

Hon. Mr. Davis: -- or provocative. But out of deference to you --

Mr. Chairman: So am I.

Mr. Nixon: What else is new? He wants you to get a new line.

Hon. Mr. Davis: Mr. Chairman, I don’t know what the night will really determine --

Mr. Lewis: Oh, no! Such sweet innocence.

Hon. Mr. Davis: I don’t, I don’t. I live in hope that sweet reason will prevail, but I somehow doubt it when I look over here.

Mr. Nixon: Support our amendment then.

Hon. Mr. Davis: I’ve given up in terms of the opposition with respect to sweet reason.

I want to say very simply, Mr. Chairman, that I honestly don’t know what the night will hold for all of us. But you, sir, have been -- and may still be, depending on what happens -- an excellent chairman.

Mr. Reid: That was a bit of a Freudian slip, there.

Hon. Mr. Davis: What do you mean, Freudian? Nothing Freudian about it.

Mr. Lewis: That was as bad as that Camille Laurin.

Mr. Sweeney: It’s strictly “Davonian.”

Hon. Mr. Davis: No, no. It might be intentional; who knows?

Mr. Chairman: Order, please. We are dealing with Mr. Breaugh’s motion.

Hon. Mr. Davis: Yes, we are, Mr. Chairman. I sense that in the Leader of the Opposition’s observations, he addressed all of his remarks specifically to that amendment, including his last observations. And I am sure you will allow me the same brief latitude and opportunity to express my own. I was interested in the suggestion by the Leader of the Opposition that certain shenanigans were being performed in this Legislature tonight.

Mr. Deans: Absolutely right.

Hon. Mr. Davis: I would say to the Leader of the Opposition and the NDP House leader that what we’re seeing here tonight is opposition by opportunism. It’s as simple as that, They know it, and I know it.

Mr. Reid: It’s election by opportunism.

Hon. Mr. Davis: They’re just using this as a political opportunity --

Mr. Lewis: I am wounded. Call me a socialist, but not an opportunist.

Hon. Mr. Davis: I would have to say to the Leader of the Opposition -- we know each other very well -- a socialist he is; a political opportunist, on occasion, he is. He knows that, and I know that.

Mr. Reid: Not as much as the Premier is.

Hon. Mr. Davis: Oh, shame, shame.

Mr. Lewis: What a flimsy pretext this is!

Mr. Deans: Any excuse.

Hon. Mr. Davis: Any excuse for what?

Mr. Deans: Any excuse for an election.

Mr. Chairman: Order. I think that it would be an opportune time to come back to the amendment we are dealing specifically with.

Hon. Mr. Davis: I think you are quite right. I mean, when the NDP House leader interjects, “Any excuse,” heavens above, he has been trying to pass motions of no confidence since we resumed.

Mr. Deans: That’s because I have no confidence in you.

Hon. Mr. Davis: That’s fine; then don’t say we’re looking for an excuse. You’re the people who want an election and it’s going to be brought about because of you, and you know it.

Interjections.

Hon. Mr. Davis: You’ve said so; you’ve said so.

Mr. Reid: You underestimate the intelligence of the people of Ontario.

Hon. Mr. Davis: Listen, your own leader said it in Exeter last night.

Mr. Chairman: Order. I’ve discussed with the Speaker that there may be some problems tonight --

Mr. Reid: That’s why he’s not here.

Mr. Chairman: -- and it is the prerogative of the chairman of the committee of the whole to suspend proceedings if he finds it necessary.

Mr. Nixon: You did that last night.

Mr. Chairman: I hope it won’t be necessary.

We’re dealing specifically with Mr. Breaugh’s amendment to section 1 of Bill 28, and I’m not going to listen to anything other than direct reference to that amendment.

An hon. Member: Why didn’t you say that before?

Mr. Lewis: Yes, that was unfair.

Hon. Mr. Davis: Mr. Chairman, I certainly will respect your observations and --

Mr. Nixon: That is a ruling.

Hon. Mr. Davis: -- a ruling -- and assume that it will apply during the course of the balance of the evening.

Mr. Breithaupt: We fervently hope so.

Hon. Mr. Davis: Mr. Chairman, dealing with the member for Oshawa’s proposed amendment, which I gather the Liberal Party of this province is not going to support -- and I think they show very excellent judgment that far -- that far --

Mr. Worton: That’s correct.

Mr. Breithaupt: That’s called being damned with fair praise.

Hon. Mr. Davis: Can I point out to the members of this House, Mr. Chairman -- and I really don’t expect that they will be persuaded -- that there are two or three very basic considerations, and the Leader of the Opposition, in his very simplistic way of dealing with figures, ignores of course some of the relevant concerns that any government must have. Those concerns are very simply having a system that works, a system that protects the legitimate concerns of the tenants of this province, understands the needs for further construction and development of rental accommodation, the need to create more job opportunities --

Interjection.

Hon. Mr. Davis: -- which, Mr. Chairman, I say with respect, that amendment will totally inhibit and that is the concern of this government. You people --

Interjections.

Mr. Lewis: Nonsense, nonsense.

Hon. Mr. Davis: You people talk about concern for the tenants. You’re prejudicing the tenants with this amendment. It’s as simple as that, you are.

Interjections.

Hon. Mr. Davis: You know, the legislation was very carefully drafted. It gave the flexibility and does give the flexibility to adjust.

Mr. Shore: Right.

Hon. Mr. Davis: It’s something that is important in terms of the longer term interests of the tenants of this province which you people across the House are totally ignoring.

You have no understanding of how the system works. You have no appreciation of what you’re doing, potentially, to the tenants of Ontario; and we are not, as a government, going to allow it to happen, it’s as simple as that.

And you know, Mr. Chairman, I hope I’m on the subject --

Mr. Reid: You’ll never sell that line.

Hon. Mr. Davis: Well, you wait. You wait.

Interjections.

Mr. Reid: You will never sell it. You brought it in only against your will.

Mr. Shore: It sells itself.

Hon. Mr. Davis: Mr. Chairman, another matter that I think is very relevant -- you know, it’s not just a philosophical consideration, it’s a very practical one --

Mr. Sargent: Your main thrust is for capital development.

Mr. Shore: Another socialist.

Hon. Mr. Davis: -- the only long-term solution to this total problem is the creation of far more rental accommodation.

Interjections.

An hon. member: We’re disappointed in you.

An hon. member: What have you been doing for 34 years?

An hon. member: You’re dead right.

Hon. Mr. Davis: That’s right, that’s right. It’s the only solution, and very simply, Mr. Chairman --

Mr. Reid: Who was in power when the shortage was created?

Mr. Breithaupt: What have you done for six years?

Mr. Chairman: Order.

Hon. Mr. Davis: This amendment would totally inhibit, totally inhibit, that potential.

Mr. Chairman, we’re all concerned in this House about employment. We’re concerned about job opportunities, and I say with respect to the members opposite this will further inhibit employment in the province of Ontario; and don’t say to us in one breath, more employment, and then try to pass this kind of amendment.

Interjections.

Mr. Breithaupt: Now you are getting political.

Hon. Mr. Davis: Mr. Chairman, we’re taking this debate on this bill seriously. We have stated it is a matter of confidence as far as this government is concerned. I’m disappointed that the members opposite would reduce this kind of debate to this kind of discussion we’ve had here tonight, because they’re completely missing the point.

Some hon. members: Oh, oh.

Mr. Sargent: Sit down.

Hon. Mr. Davis: Well, I would say to the member for Grey-Bruce I’m delighted to hear his observations at some point down the road.

Mr. Sargent: You are disappointed -- with 300,000 people out of work?

Interjections.

Hon. Mr. Davis: Mr. Chairman, I would say to the member for Grey-Bruce there are more people unemployed than any of us can tolerate. I would say to him, when he votes against this amendment, it will be because he knows -- he knows -- that it is going to make the problem more difficult rather than finding a solution, no question about it.

Interjections.

Mr. Reid: The Treasurer (Mr. McKeough) admired him.

[8:45]

Hon. Mr. Davis: Mr. Chairman, I want to say to the members opposite in conclusion, they may not think this is serious but this government does. We stand by the bill that has been presented after very careful consideration by the minister responsible -- we are doing it for the short-term and long-term interests of the tenants of this province. We want to see more accommodation built. We want to see more employment. That is why we are going to vote against that amendment.

Mr. Chairman: The member for Wentworth now has the floor.

Mr. Deans: Thank you very much. I hadn’t asked for it before.

Mr. Chairman: You took it, though.

Mr. Deans: Mr. Chairman, the Premier makes reference to the fact that we are dealing with this legislation. I want to deal with this legislation and nothing else. I want first of all to say I would have assumed that the legislation, having been properly researched, would have presented accurate statistics to the Legislature to deal with the cost inflationary factors.

We have found in our review of what was presented to the Legislature that it is wanting in a number of different areas. We have found in reviewing the legislation and the proposed eight per cent level that the eight per cent reflects not only the legitimate inflation factors but a level of inflation far in excess of that which any reasonable person could expect in the province of Ontario.

Hon. Mr. Norton: You are ignoring the facts.

Mr. Deans: The Premier speaks of the need to have further rental accommodation built. This government under this Premier has been in office now for about seven years. I want to say that if there is a problem in rental construction it can be blamed only on this government of Bill Davis.

Interjections.

Mr. Deans: I want to say further to the House that if the Premier doesn’t accept the responsibility during his term of office, then if he wishes he can pass it on to Conservative governments that preceded him. But whatever is wrong in the construction industry in the province of Ontario as it applies to rental accommodation must be faced by this Conservative government because this Conservative government and Conservative governments that preceded it have had ample opportunity to resolve the difficulties.

Hon. Mr. Norton: Give us a chance.

Mr. Breithaupt: Not after 34 years, not another chance.

Mr. Deans: This government, though its Minister of Consumer and Commercial Relations, has suggested to the Legislature that eight per cent is an adequate figure. We have, after very careful consideration and research, determined that eight per cent is completely out of line with those figures used by other agencies for the purposes of computing cost attribution.

Hon. Mr. Norton: Which ones?

Mr. Deans: We have determined that the government has built in inflationary factors that are not realistic in accordance with the system in operation in the province of Ontario today.

Hon. Mr. Norton: Which other agencies are you talking about?

Mr. Deans: We have suggested to the government that if it were to use, as my leader has said and as the member for Oshawa has said, the statistics and the studies that are on record, it would have come to a realization that it couldn’t justify more than 45 per cent to 50 per cent as being attributed to municipal taxes, maintenance and repairs, administrative costs, fuel costs and electricity and water costs.

We are suggesting to the government that if it wants to sell its eight per cent then it has to be able to produce not only some kind of pie in the sky view based on an attempt to provide additional revenue for the developer in the province of Ontario and the apartment owner in the province of Ontario, but has to present to the Legislature statistics based on the common usage by most people operating in the apartment industry. That is what the government has not done.

We suggest, for example, the government puts the position that it has to allow a 30 per cent inflation factor in fuel costs because we might have an extremely cold winter in the coming year. I want to tell the House that if the government is going to base fuel costs on last winter, which was by any standard exceptional --

Hon. Mr. Handleman: That is the cost we are talking about.

Mr. Deans: -- if the government is going to base it on that for the recovery of costs in 1977 and 1978 --

Hon. Mr. Handleman: 1977.

Mr. Deans: -- then I suggest that is totally wrong.

Hon. Mr. Handleman: It’s 1977 costs, my friend.

Hon. Mr. Meen: You don’t understand rent review, how it works.

Mr. Deans: No, that is totally wrong.

Hon. Mr. Handleman: It was this winter. Do you know what year we are in? Let’s find out what year we are in before you talk.

Mr. Deans: I know; 1977-78 we are talking about.

Hon. Mr. Rhodes: You think we’re working against next year.

Hon. Mr. Handleman: No, we are talking about 1977.

Mr. Chairman: Order, please. The minister will have an opportunity to reply.

Mr. Deans: I also want to suggest to the minister that Central Mortgage and Housing Corporation, which is very much in the field -- and the minister knows this -- and even Ontario Housing Corporation, which is very much in the field, does not allow 55 per cent for the combination of administrative and operating costs. Ontario Housing Corporation doesn’t allow that high a level, and if it doesn’t, and this is a government agency of the province of Ontario, how then can that calculation be made for the purposes of the private sector?

Hon. Mr. Norton: Fifty-five per cent of what?

Mr. Deans: I want to suggest, further, that since there is a very clear avenue for landlords to come before the board and to explain and to prove any cost above what is reasonable, we are not depriving one single person of recovering any legitimate costs if we set the level at six per cent.

Hon. Mr. Norton: Oh, yes you are.

Mr. Deans: Not one single person.

Interjection.

Mr. Deans: But because it is both costly and difficult for the average tenant to appeal a two per cent increase because he has to take time off work, because he has to go before the board, because he has to prepare a case against evidence that he is not sure of --

Mr. Grossman: The same as for landlords.

Mr. Deans: -- the average tenant is less likely to appeal the two per cent than is the average corporate landlord.

Mr. Grossman: I’m not sure of that.

Mr. Deans: So what you do is you take the lowest legitimate cost and you establish that as your base, in order to protect tenants against loss of wages --

Mr. Grossman: Then you get a lot of appeals.

Mr. Deans: -- and to protect tenants against the very difficult time that they have, normally never having to appear before any tribunal of any kind, from the fear of --

Mr. Grossman: And they end up with more appeals and red tape under your amendment.

Mr. Deans: -- showing up and not being able to present their case adequately. On the other hand, you say to the landlord, “If you have costs, costs that are legitimate, costs that can be proven, costs that show a rent increase above the level of six per cent, you are perfectly entitled and expected to bring your case before the board and the board should and can approve it.”

Mr. Grossman: And the tenants will have to go to an appeal and prepare his case, taking the day off work.

Mr. Deans: I say to you that any landlord who believes he can get 12 per cent will go before the board regardless of whether the level we establish is eight per cent or six per cent

Mr. Grossman: Go for four per cent, it sounds better.

Mr. Deans: Any tenant who thinks that eight per cent might be more reasonable is not likely to go for the level of six per cent, but certainly would not go for an appeal for a lower level if the level was set at eight per cent.

Mr. Grossman: Tenants will like that.

Mr. Chairman: Will the member for St. Andrew-St. Patrick stop his mumbling?

Mr. Nixon: Speak up, speak up.

Mr. Deans: I want to tell the Premier that the basis upon which you intend to fight your election is phoney.

Mr. Breithaupt: Mr. Chairman, only with respect to the current amendment that is before us, as you are aware --

Mr. Shore: Where is the housing critic and finance critic?

Mr. Breithaupt: -- there are to be placed before the House two amendments dealing particularly with this area and I would like direction from the Chair as to whether in the opinion of the Chair the second amendment should also be put so that, in effect, both matters could be discussed satisfactorily on all sides of the House. If the Chair would agree to that, the member for Perth could put his amendment and speak to it as well and then the general discussion on both of the areas under discussion could proceed.

Mr. Deans: Mr. Chairman, on a point of order --

Mr. Chairman: You asked for direction. It seemed to be a consensus that the committee should deal with them as individual motions and that is what we are doing.

Mr. Deans: Mr. Chairman, if I may, a consensus would surely reflect the view of the majority. We have no objection.

Mr. Chairman: We have only one amendment before the committee at the present time, so there is only one to be discussed.

Mr. Lewis: Mr. Chairman, on a point of order, not only would we support this, we would support it for another reason. We want to divide the House, obviously, on these amendments, on both of them, and, given the time tonight -- the other amendments can be stacked; these are central, these are the crucial votes -- I think if the House had a sense of both amendments we could debate them in conjunction, since this is taking longer, and no one would be the loser. Then they can be voted on one after the other at some appropriate moment.

Mr. Chairman: It’s a reversal of the former consensus that we seemed to have arrived at. We only have one motion. If it is the consensus that we deal with both of them at once, I would suggest that the hon. member for Perth put his amendment.

Mr. Edighoffer: Mr. Chairman, under the circumstances I’ll be glad to put it. I thought the original intent was to do it separately.

Mr. Chairman: Mr. Edighoffer moves that subsection 1 of section 5 of the Act, as set out in section 1(1) of the bill, be amended by striking out in the sixth and seventh line “by more than eight per cent”; and by adding after “for residential premises” in the sixth line the words, “by the lesser of eight per cent or the rate of increase for compensation allowed under the basic protection factor and national productivity factor, as outlined in Part 4 of The Anti-Inflation Act Guidelines Canada.”

Mr. Edighoffer: In speaking to the amendment, Mr. Chairman, I’d like to have it on the record that this party takes this Legislature very seriously. I feel that with this amendment we are trying to make minority government work.

Mr. O’Neil: There goes the Premier.

Mr. Good: You don’t want it to work.

Interjections.

Mr. Edighoffer: When discussing this legislation previously, I presented a number of reasons concerning this amendment. But I’d like, briefly, to make just a few more comments in support of this amendment.

I’d like first of all to remind the government that when this legislation was introduced into the Legislature in 1975, the then Minister of Housing, who had responsibility for this legislation, stated, and it’s very brief: “It should also be viewed in the context of the federal government’s anti-inflation measures, which it is designed to complement.”

Hon. Mr. Norton: Understand the relationship; it is not one to one.

An hon. member: That’s in your own words.

An hon. member: Then the flip flop.

Mr. Edighoffer: And of course during the Throne Speech, similar comments were made to the effect that this legislation should be tied to the anti-inflation guidelines.

Mr. Shore: How does the finance critic feel about this?

Mr. Nixon: You were over here then Marvin, don’t worry.

Mr. Edighoffer: It has been said in this debate that if wages are geared to guidelines, accommodation rates should be geared to guidelines. However, the system allows landlords and tenants an appeal to include pass-through costs. I’d also like to remind the members of the House that during the second reading the first speaker for the New Democratic Party, the member for Oshawa, concluded his remarks by saying, “We think, too, that the maximum rent increase permitted without appeal to the rent review process should be reduced from eight to six per cent to make it consistent with the anti-inflation board programme.”

Mr. Nixon: That’s why they are voting for our amendment.

Mr. Edighoffer: Mr. Chairman, this Legislature signed an agreement with the Anti-Inflation Board to apply the national guidelines to the provincial public sector, and the province agreed that the national guidelines would also apply to a great number of bodies in the province, bodies which provide what are generally considered to be public services. I would certainly urge, and ask, all members of the Legislature to support this amendment which I feel is the proper way to extend the legislation for rent review until December 31, 1978.

[9:00]

Hon. Mr. Handleman: Mr. Chairman, certainly I have no wish either to engage in political debate with any of the speakers who have spoken. I just want to respond to the Leader of the Opposition briefly.

Mr. Breithaupt: It’s surely the best place for politics.

Hon. Mr. Handleman: Yes, we’re aware of the BC study. It may come as a surprise to him that Karl Jaffray writes to us once in a while and tells us what’s going on. As a result of that study the former BC government adopted a guideline of 10.6 per cent for the first year. The succeeding government accepted that guideline, 10.6 per cent, for the second year. Now, in the third year of rent review in British Columbia --

Mr. Lewis: It’s down to seven per cent.

Hon. Mr. Handleman: -- they’ve gone to seven per cent, on the basis of the fact that the vacancy rate everywhere except in greater Vancouver is well above five per cent. There’s no reason for them to stick to anything less.

Mr. Wildman: We discussed vacancy rates.

Hon. Mr. Handleman: It’s the only guideline under 10 per cent in the western provinces.

I might also mention that, yes, we’re aware of the CMHC guideline which they use in determining rent increases for limited-dividend housing. The average rent increase for limited-dividend housing in the face of the CMHC figures has been roughly 15 per cent, which in our rent review process has generally been reduced to an average of about 12 per cent.

So we’re reducing rents following the formula mentioned by the Leader of the Opposition. I want him to know that our figures -- and I don’t know what the BC figures were based on; I don’t know what CMHC’s figures are based on but we’ve done 125,000 detailed reviews of rental figures in this province before our rent review boards and I think that our figures, based on that kind of a study, are somewhat reliable.

Without speaking in great detail to the amendment put forward by the member for Perth, I might ask him before we get into discussion of it if he might just make a slight technical correction. I heard from the member for London Centre yesterday about the great research they have, I wonder if he would name the Act properly in his amendment. Give us the real Act so that if this amendment should carry, at least it will be technically correct. Legally, the title of the document he’s referring to is the Anti-Inflation Guidelines. I wonder if he might make that change so we can discuss the amendment with some meaning.

Mr. Kerrio: We can still discuss it.

Mr. Breithaupt: Anything to oblige.

Mr. Deputy Chairman: The hon. member for Oshawa.

Mr. Breaugh: Mr. Chairman, since you have made the ruling that we can deal with this issue at once, I’d like to move an amendment to Mr. Edighoffer’s amendment.

I move that the amendment amended by adding thereto the following phrase; “understanding that the specified rate of increase on October 14, 1977 will be six per cent.”

Mr. Good: Oh, you’re trying to do what you couldn’t do in your original motion.

Mr. Deputy Chairman: Could I have a copy of the amendment?

Mr. Breaugh: Yes.

Mr. Deputy Chairman: Thank you.

Mr. Breaugh: If I could just speak very briefly to that?

Mr. Nixon: Point of order. Perhaps he could read the amendment to the amendment, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. Deputy Chairman: Would you allow the Chair to read the amendment to the amendment?

Hon. Mr. Handleman: How about delivering copies?

Mr. Breaugh: Right there. You should not be the one to argue about who --

Mr. Deputy Chairman: Order, please.

Mr. Breaugh moves that Mr. Edighoffer’s amendment be amended by adding thereto the following phrase, “understanding that the specified rate of increase at October 14, 1977 will be six per cent.”

Mr. Breithaupt: Mr. Chairman, with respect to that subamendment, might I suggest that --

Mr. Nixon: Point of order.

Mr. Breithaupt: Might I suggest that the matter, on a point of order, is already before the House in the original amendment which has been put by the official opposition.

Mr. MacDonald: No, it is not.

Mr. Nixon: Let’s let the Chairman decide.

Mr. Breithaupt: As a result, I would presume, only from my hearing of the amendment -- I have not seen it as yet -- that the Chair should seriously consider whether the matter is already before the House.

Mr. Nixon: Of course it is.

Mr. Lewis: On a point of order, Mr. Chairman. The first motion of six per cent which is embodied in the amendment clearly takes place on August 1. This subamendment to the Liberal amendment clearly applies to October 14, 1977. They are quite different, therefore, in nature. One speaks of an event 10 weeks later.

Mr. Deputy Chairman: The Chair would rule that Mr. Breaugh’s amendment to the amendment is in order.

Mr. Breaugh: Mr. Chairman, very briefly, it was very clear in the Liberal Party’s initial statements on the principle of the bill that that’s what they intended. It’s been further reinforced that that’s the way they want to go. We are very simply saying let us be extremely clear about what’s there. I would express great reservations that should the unforeseen happen and an election be called and we are faced with a different form of a government, that we should be extremely clear in this legislation this evening exactly what we mean. The subamendment is before the House very simply to be explicit about what you mean, not to confuse it with anything else that might be prevalent in the motion. I understand the intent of the motion is very specifically this, it would accomplish the same thing, I am simply asking the members of the House to be specific about the exact number and when it takes effect. I think that is a fair thing to do. I think the amendment that Mr. Edighoffer proposed intends to do that. There isn’t any great disagreement on that and I would ask their support in this subamendment.

Mr. Deputy Chairman: The hon. member for Hamilton West.

Mr. S. Smith: I shall be brief in my remarks. The economy of this country and this province is clearly in trouble. People are suffering. We in the Liberal Party believe that the Anti-Inflation Board was and is a reasonable way to attempt to cope with the ravages of inflation, even though we recognize that in limiting the wages of working people, hardship has been created. We believe that when you limit the wages of working people you limit their rent increases at exactly the same level.

The Premier apparently wants an election. He can and is entitled to use any excuse he chooses to call an election. He has that right. He can even use the excuse, as he mentioned the other day, that I criticize him from time to time.

Mr. Breithaupt: He doesn’t like that.

Hon. Mr. Davis: On a point of order --

Interjections.

Mr. Deputy Chairman: That is not a point of order.

Interjections.

Mr. S. Smith: He thinks that he will get a majority, and he certainly wants a majority. He’ll use whatever excuse he can to call the election.

Interjections.

Mr. Deputy Chairman: Order, please. Perhaps the hon. member would return to the debate on the amendment.

Mr. S. Smith: The Premier says in simple words, regarding the cost of shelter, that in the province of Ontario he cannot give tenants protection to counter the level at which their wages are being controlled by the Anti-Inflation Board. We say very simply that we can give that protection and that we must give that protection.

Mr. Deputy Chairman: Order, please. The hon. minister.

Hon. Mr. Handleman: Mr. Chairman, I’d like to speak to the amendment. I ask the member for Perth if he would please check the technicality, because in the event this amendment should carry -- and there appears to be some indication from our friends over on the NDP benches that it might -- I would hope that at least it would be an amendment that could be administered. That’s all; we’re not asking for too much.

Mr. Nixon: The whole thing was a mess to begin with.

Mr. Breithaupt: You’d be the last person we’d want to administer it.

Interjections.

Hon. Mr. Handleman: I would ask, Mr. Chairman, that in the heat of the debate here tonight we not pass gibberish.

Mr. Reid: You should join the colleague next to you.

Mr. Conway: I thought you said you would resign if rent control was continued.

Hon. Mr. Handleman: Let’s please make it clear; let’s use the proper names so that when it goes to the courts, if it does, the courts would be able to relate to sound law. We are not asking too much. I would hope that the member for Perth is out checking this and will make that correction. It isn’t too much to make.

Interjection.

Mr. Deputy Chairman: Order, please.

Hon. Mr. Handleman: I wonder if I could speak to the substance of the amendment. I hope that the member for Perth, when he comes in after checking with Ottawa or wherever he gets his advice, will make that change.

Mr. Conway: I thought you were quitting.

Mr. Reid: In your case there is no person to phone in Ottawa.

Interjections.

Mr. Deputy Chairman: Order, please.

Hon. Mr. Handleman: We received some preliminary notice of the amendment a few days ago. It has since been changed, but we did receive notice in accordance with the two-hour rule that we all agreed to, and we’ve had some legal research done on it. The amendment relates to a section of the Anti-Inflation Guidelines called Part IV of the Anti-Inflation Guidelines. We have taken that and we have studied it. It indicates that if the Liberal amendment carries, whether or not the subamendment is attached to it, we’re talking in terms of a three-component factor. Those components are spelled out very clearly. As we all know, there is a basic protection factor in the guidelines. Everybody knows what that is.

Mr. Nixon: Four per cent.

Hon. Mr. Handleman: There’s a national productivity factor, and that’s a flat two per cent based on historic facts -- and those are known.

Mr. Nixon: Two per cent. That’s up to six.

Hon. Mr. Handleman: The one that is not known is the third factor. It is determined by Statistics Canada on the basis of information given to them. It will not be known until November 15. We have an amendment which takes effect on October 14 which will incorporate a factor which is not known until November 15.

Hon. Mr. Norton: You have to give three months’ notice.

Hon. Mr. Handleman: Under the rest of our Act, which I think everybody in this House knows, landlords must give to a tenant 90 days’ notice of a rent increase, 60 days’ notice to a rent review officer of his intention to apply for rent review. How on earth can that work when you don’t know your figure until November 15, a month after it takes effect?

I simply ask the members of this House, when they’re voting on this amendment, to recognize what they’re doing. They’re putting gibberish into the law.

Hon. Mr. Davis: He’s right.

Interjections.

Mr. Lewis: Mr. Chairman, with respect to the Premier’s interjection that the Minister of Consumer and Commercial Relations is right, with great respect, he’s not. There is a factor which must be calculated, which is precisely why those of us of the New Democratic Party affixed a subamendment to the proposition that it should be understood to be at six per cent. We know that if the factor shows some marginal alteration, it is still worthy of support because it will come in under eight per cent and, therefore, will be beneficial to the tenants.

I want to point out to you that the inflation factor which is to be computed as your third component was, from October 1975 to 1976, 6.2 per cent; November 1975 to 1976, 5.6 per cent; December 1975 to 1976, 5.8 per cent. In other words, it is coming in now on the basis of a figure approximating six per cent -- it might come in slightly below, it might come in slightly above. That’s why we have placed the six per cent. That’s why we hope the Liberals will seriously consider supporting our subamendment because it will be absolutely clear.

I want to tell you, Mr. Chairman, nobody in this party likes to tie anything to the disreputable and shabby nature of so much of the Anti-Inflation Board’s guidelines. I want you to know that. It bothers us to have that relationship, so we’re looking at what it means.

Mr. Nixon: That sounds like Joe Morris talking.

Mr. Lewis: And what it means, Mr. Chairman, is a level of rent for the tenants of Ontario of something in the vicinity of six per cent. By our subamendment it would clearly be six per cent and that’s what we put to the minister. It’s completely uncomplicated.

Mr. Deans: And it’s simple to appeal.

Mr. Lewis: There’s nothing difficult about it. It’s entirely supportable and that’s why it should be supported, because --

An hon. member: Back in 1975 you supported the government.

Mr. Lewis: -- it can be independently authenticated as well as tied. It’s as simple as that.

Hon. Mr. Norton: And it’s deceptively simplistic.

Mr. MacDonald: It’s not gibberish, it’s precise.

Interjections.

Mrs. Campbell: In rising to speak to our amendment, I would just like to say that I find it sad that we are called upon to debate a very important piece of legislation in the kind of spirit which is prevailing, due, Mr. Chairman, to the administrative incompetency of this government.

Hon. Mr. Davis: That’s provocative.

Interjections.

Mr. Sweeney: It was intended to be.

Mr. Deputy Chairman: Order, please. The hon. member will continue without interruption.

[9:15]

Mrs. Campbell: Mr. Chairman, as you are aware, the government has, in fact, tied this bill in its extension, and indeed in its initial introduction, to the AIB which this government has supported. To me, it is improper that we should not tie this increase to the AIB guidelines for the reasons given by my leader. The people in this province, and certainly in the major cities, have been suffering as it is. One of the reasons I am prepared to support our amendment, rather than that of the NDP, is simply on a matter of very stark reality for the tenants, and certainly those in the city of Toronto. Many of those tenants have had increases of eight per cent for whatever reason the landlord has in not wishing to proceed to the rent review board.

Mr. Nixon: The minister asked them not to.

Mrs. Campbell: Whether the minister asked them or not, they had their reasons; they may not have wanted to go through the problems of disclosing all their figures. I don’t care what the reason is; it is a fact that many have not proceeded and have stayed within the eight per cent. For this reason, I believe that the tenants in this stage of the legislation are better protected because it has been my experience that there have been increases of more than eight per cent, some of them I believe improper -- but that is a matter for the courts. I have witnessed some increases, and I believe that the tenants by and large are protected by the eight per cent at this point in time.

I believe that until the guidelines are changed and the effective change is made, landlords are in a very good position to argue the fact that the cost of labour is going to be at a higher rate than their permitted increases. However, to me, that changes significantly when the guideline effect changes; and I would believe that at that point in time the landlords in all likelihood would not pressure for the review. They may, but at least I feel, having talked extensively with tenants in my riding, that they are prepared to accept the eight per cent at this point rather than risk going through to rent review at this time.

I may say that I was questioned very closely by tenants last evening as to our position and why I wasn’t adopting the simple solution put forward by the NDP. I made that explanation and they believed, in the final analysis, that we are right. Therefore, Mr. Chairman, I believe we have to always bear in mind not only what seems to me on occasion to be political expediency but the practicality of the situation. After all, the people we are concerned about in this bill, as I see it, are the tenants.

Mr. Shore: Right on.

Interjection.

Mr. Reid: Changing parties again, Marv?

Mrs. Campbell: I am pleased to be here debating the extension of this legislation because there is no doubt in the minds of the people I represent that my bill, brought in some 18 months before the government saw fit to effect it --

Mr. Nixon: It was the cornerstone.

Mrs. Campbell: -- was a cornerstone for this legislation.

Mr. Nixon: It was a better bill than yours. Margaret Campbell was the mother of rent review.

Mrs. Campbell: I believe it is because of that that they are accepting our amendment so strongly.

Mr. Deputy Chairman: The hon. member for Muskoka.

Mr. Nixon: He must be in trouble up there. Looking for another promotion.

Hon. F. S. Miller: I may be in trouble up there, but you haven’t even got a candidate up there, Mr. Chairman, I don’t enter into debates around here too often --

Mr. Nixon: Why don’t you go out and close a few hospitals?

Mr. Deputy Chairman: Order, please.

Hon. Mr. Davis: You guys wish your seats were as safe.

Hon. F. S. Miller: I don’t enter into debates around here too often, but I’ve been sitting here --

Mr. Nixon: You ought to know, you’ve got a front row seat

Hon. F. S. Miller: That’s because I basically want to add to the quality of the debate, and silence sometimes is the best way to do so.

Interjections.

Hon. F. S. Miller: I’ve been sitting here listening to figures coming out of the NDP in a steady stream.

Mr. Nixon: Now we’re going to get philosophy.

Hon. F. S. Miller: I’ve been listening to gobbledygook coming out of the Liberals in a steady stream, and I’m reminded of the old saw that figures don’t lie but liars figure.

Mr. Ruston: You did a lot of lying and figuring on the hospitals.

Mr. Deputy Chairman: Order, please.

Mr. Nixon: How about doing a regression analysis on that?

Mr. Reid: Like your figures on the hospitals?

Hon. F. S. Miller: There’s one thing about the NDP amendment tonight: I can understand it. I can’t understand the Liberal amendments; I suspect very few other people in the province could.

Mr. Ruston: That’s why they took you out of the Health ministry.

Mr. Deputy Chairman: Order, please. The hon. member for Muskoka is speaking.

Hon. F. S. Miller: It’s easy to appear to be on the tenants’ side by going for a lower figure. It’s easy to say that six per cent protects the tenants’ interest and, therefore, “We’re on their side” --

Mr. Reid: Did you ever hear the Treasurer talk about the AIB?

Hon. F. S. Miller: -- “and the dirty old PCs are on the other side,” the landlords’ side, by asking for eight per cent; but that’s not true. I am tired --

Mr. Ruston: So is your government.

Hon. F. S. Miller: -- I am tired of the NDP always pretending to be on the side of the average guy when in fact this party has been for many years. This is the party that’s caused the wealth in this province, that’s given us 34 years of solid, sound, good government and economic progress.

Mr. Bain: The workers in this province did it, not the Tories.

Mr. Deputy Chairman: Order.

Hon. F. S. Miller: It’s not just geography, it’s the fact that we have created the stability that caused people to be willing to invest here and therefore gave this --

Mr. Reid: What about the unemployment figures?

Mr. Breithaupt: You haven’t created any housing.

Mr. Nixon: That stability is a great phrase. Pearson really parlayed that into something. You should grab hold of that one.

An hon. member: They don’t like it because they know it’s true.

Mr. Deputy Chairman: Order, please.

Hon. F. S. Miller: This government is willing to make tough decisions, and eight per cent right now --

Mr. Reid: This isn’t your style, Frank; sit down.

Mr. Deputy Chairman: Order, please. Will the hon. member for Rainy River desist from the interjections.

Mr. Nixon: Looks like the leadership campaign has started.

Mr. Deputy Chairman: Order, please.

Hon. F. S. Miller: Eight per cent is in the interests of the tenants because it will cut out thousands of appeals, it will stimulate more rental housing, it will cause competition in the marketplace and in the long run it will re-elect us.

Mr. Nixon: What was that all about?

Mr. Reid: What was that all about?

Mr. Deputy Chairman: Order, please. The hon. member for Kitchener-Waterloo has the floor.

Mr. Sweeney: Mr. Chairman, given that this is An Act to amend the Residential Premises Rent Review Act, perhaps we could, just for a minute, refer back to the original Act.

Hon. Mr. Handleman: Oh, Mr. Chairman.

Hon. Mr. Davis: Oh, that’s out of order.

Mr. Sweeney: It was very clear, very clear --

Mr. Deputy Chairman: Order, please. You will have to speak to the amendment.

Mr. Sweeney: It was very clear that when we all spoke to that Act, we indicated that we wanted to bring down --

Mr. Deputy Chairman: Order, please. The hon. member has a point of order.

Hon. Mr. Handleman: On a point of order, Mr. Chairman, it seems to me that we have spoken at great length and we’ve gone around the Act a great deal, but I think we should be really speaking to the amendment and the NDP subamendment and nothing else.

Mr. Nixon: You said it was a mess.

Mr. Cunningham: What was that over there?

Mr. Deputy Chairman: Order please; order. The Chair agrees that we should be directing comment to the subamendment. I thought perhaps the preamble was going to lead into it, but would he kindly direct his remarks to that immediately?

Mr. Sweeney: It is fully my intention to do so. The entire thrust of the original amendment and this amendment is to create in this province a social contract between landlords and tenants. We said then, and I wish to repeat today, that a social contract can only work if both sides -- both sides, Mr. Chairman -- feel that they are being treated with some fairness, with some justice.

Just as we said then, we have to say again today, that can only be done if both sides understand the source of the other’s request; the tenants understanding the source of the landlord’s request, the landlord understanding the source of the tenants’ reaction to that request. That’s the social contract.

Hon. Mr. Norton: You don’t understand the original Act.

Mr. Sweeney: May I cite two recent examples of that very principle and as they apply to this amendment to this bill. Within the last three months --

Mr. Deputy Chairman: Order, please. Would you direct your comments to this specific amendment?

Mr. Sweeney: I am, Mr. Chairman. Within the last three months, there was a request from a landlord in my riding for a 65 per cent rental increase. The problem was that the land transfer tax got him caught in mortgage arrangements. That went through all the various machinations that are available in this province now. It was substantially reduced, as you might well expect, because the tenants had something to stand on. They were able to stand up and challenge a landlord who was clearly out of line in making his request.

Hon. B. Stephenson: But it won’t happen with your amendment.

Hon. Mr. Davis: With your amendment they won’t have anything.

An hon. member: You’re standing in quicksand with yours.

Mr. Sweeney: The second example was a lady who phoned me just a few days ago and indicated that her landlord was asking for a 33 per cent increase --

Mr. Deputy Chairman: Order, please. Would the hon. member specifically direct his comments to the amendment? Would he continue his debate, but speak directly to the amendment to the amendment?

Mr. Sweeney: I am, Mr. Chairman. I am speaking directly to it.

Mr. Hodgson: No, you’re not, you haven’t even mentioned it.

Mr. Sweeney: That 33 per cent increase turned out to be an increase from $75 to $100 for a two-bedroom apartment in good condition. The lady clearly recognized, after discussing it with us, that the request was not out of line.

The point I am trying to make is that you can throw around figures any way you want. Earlier today, the minister handed us a piece of paper with some figures on it. Those figures have been disputed. Just a few minutes ago the Leader of the Opposition reacted to those figures. He said, for example -- and this is in the record -- that the administrative cost should have an inflation factor of 10 instead of 20. All right. For the sake of discussion, let’s accept that. He also said that for the fuel cost the inflation factor should be 20 instead of 30. He then went on to say that if we accept that, then we come up with a figure which I believe was 5.2 or 5.8 or 5.9 per cent, but they settled for 6.

Mr. Lewis: Right.

Mr. Sweeney: Mr. Chairman, using the Leader of the Opposition’s own figures, we would change the third column, under administration, from 1.8 to 1.9; we would change the third column, under fuel cost, from 2.1 to 1.4. If you add them up, you come to 7.05 -- you don’t come to 5.2 or 5.8. I’m just trying to make one clear point. The members on that side are picking figures right out of the air to support their position; the members here are picking figures out of the air to support their position.

Interjections.

[9:30]

Mr. Sweeney: This party is standing foursquare and very --

Mr. Shore: You just killed the argument right there.

Mr. Sweeney: -- clearly on figures that can be documented, figures that will be specified and figures that are tied in directly with a man’s income; and it’s a man’s income by which he pays his rent. Whatever that income is going to be, that is what his rent should be -- not figures that you pick out of the air, not figures that you pick out of the air.

Mr. Grossman: Mr. Chairman, I want to address some remarks --

Mr. Conway: Here’s the next chairman of the liquor board.

Mr. Grossman: -- to the two per cent solution as attempted by the opposition in order to bail themselves out of a difficult situation.

Mr. Bullbrook: Stand up.

Mr. Grossman: What they’re trying to do across the floor with this amendment, Mr. Chairman --

Mr. Lewis: That is actually not bad -- not bad -- not bad at all.

Mr. Grossman: What they’re trying to do is identify another group that they can play to --

Mr. Bain: At least we are not playing to Bay Street.

Mr. Grossman: -- by offering them some money back, offering to underbid the government

Mr. Deans: That is not true.

Mr. Grossman: What do they do? Firstly, they stand up and attempt to criticize the use of figures by the minister responsible, and they argue and argue that their interpretation of the figures should work as though there were some magic to these AIB figures.

Mr. Sweeney: That is where the money comes from.

Mr. Nixon: The Treasurer thinks they are good.

Mr. Grossman: In point of fact, the proof of the eight per cent figure is in the number of cases that ended up before the rent review board. How many landlords could live with the eight per cent and how many tenants could live with whatever rents they were charged under there? The point of the situation and the fact of the situation is that it worked fairly well. A lot of landlords decided that they would live with eight per cent or less. A lot of them did. Those that did not found, as the member for Wentworth has said, that they often got 12 per cent.

Mr. Deans: That’s right.

Mr. Grossman: But the fact is that, after the first six or eight months of the programme, things had settled down pretty well, so that the numbers of cases that were before the rent review officers had substantially decreased. It was evidence that the system was adjusting well to eight per cent. Everyone by that stage had lived comfortably with eight per cent.

Mr. Sweeney: And keep their wages at eight per cent too.

Hon. Mr. Handleman: They went up by 9.8 per cent last year.

Mr. Grossman: What’s occurring now is an attempt to go to the old two per cent solution: “Let’s see if we can underbid the government.” What I find interesting are the attempts this evening, especially of the official opposition, to attempt to tie the six per cent figure to the AIB guidelines.

Mr. Deans: No, no.

Mr. Grossman: What’s interesting is that it’s the same six per cent figure they were using immediately after the September 1975 election. You remember that one.

Mr. Lewis: That’s right.

Mr. Grossman: It was six per cent then; now they’re still at six per cent and groping in the last little while to juggle the figures used by the Minister of Consumer and Commercial Relations to justify the same six per cent figure they used a year and a half ago.

Mr. Deans: His figures are wrong.

Mr. Grossman: It’s about time someone started to treat the tenants of this province with a little bit of respect and acknowledge that they ought not to be used and bargained away for election purposes.

Mr. Breithaupt: Then our amendment will carry.

Mr. S. Smith: Why did you need the paragraph letting you lower it at any time?

Mr. Grossman: I happen to represent a riding that has almost 50 per cent of its citizens living as tenants in apartments, rooming houses or duplexes.

An hon. member: And they are being poorly represented.

Mr. S. Smith: They won’t vote for you next time.

Mr. Nixon: The other half are in Doctors Hospital.

Mr. Grossman: It would be very comfortable for me to play the game that’s so easy for the opposition --

Mr. Wildman: You have been doing that for years.

Mr. Grossman: -- which is to underbid the latest offer, to bribe them with their own money, and pretend that I can go to them and offer them a better deal than the NDP and the Liberals. Mr. Chairman, I’m prepared --

Mr. S. Smith: To close hospitals to save money.

Mr. Grossman: -- to treat tenants as mature enough not to be bribed by a two per cent solution --

Mr. Lewis: Oh, come on. Don’t be condescending. Don’t be patronizing.

Mr. Grossman: -- not to be influenced by the short-term remedy that’s politically expedient but not in their long-term interests.

Mr. Lewis: Oh come on. Not in their long-term interests.

Mr. Grossman: A word about the Anti-Inflation Board. It is a very neat attempt by the Liberal Party to attempt to suggest that this should be tied in to the AIB figures on wages plus productivity and so on.

Mr. Nixon: We are not attempting to suggest anything.

Mr. S. Smith: We are doing it.

Mr. Grossman: But the rent review programme was not instituted by the federal Anti-Inflation Board across the country for the very good reason that they understood that situations differed from province to province in this particular area. For example, when the member opposite -- I think it was the member for Wentworth -- wanted to use the figures from BC -- maybe it was the Leader of the Opposition -- the Anti-Inflation Board in Ottawa was sensible enough to understand that it is just conceivable that energy costs in BC may not be quite the same as energy costs in Ontario or Newfoundland.

Mr. Deans: You have a fixation with BC.

Mr. Sargent: They aren’t $11 billion in debt either.

Mr. Grossman: Therefore, they said: “Provinces, we think that it is appropriate that you develop rent review programmes on your own to complement an anti-inflation programme throughout the country.”

Mr. Kerrio: Your Minister of Housing said that.

Mr. Grossman: Had it been realistic to tie it into any of these magic figures surely your friends in Ottawa would have said that. But they were mature enough -- and, I suppose, not needing to bargain for tenants’ votes -- not to jump to that approach.

Mr. S. Smith: Not a federal jurisdiction, and you know it.

Mr. Grossman: What we did in Ontario was the sensible solution. What happened here was not a tie-in to any magic figures, but very simply an understanding that the basis of having an alive economy protecting everyone was to permit a pass-through of costs. If you don’t permit a legitimate pass-through of costs then you are not going to have one twit of relief for tenants two years from today, when we are back here debating -- and I’ll be back here debating -- the renewal of a rent review programme.

Mr. S. Smith: And your son after you.

Mr. Grossman: The member for Wentworth stands up and complains and complains --

Mr. Conway: Stand up Larry. Stand up.

Mr. Grossman: -- sweating heavily for appropriate reasons, that at the rent review hearing, by common acknowledgement, the figure has turned out to be 12 per cent. So what is he going to do? He is going to forget about all those landlords who said, “Look, I didn’t go to rent review because it just wasn’t worth it. Maybe I’ll move from eight to 10. Maybe I’ll get less. Sure I have some tenants coming off two and three year leases, but I think I’ll make do with eight per cent.”

Mr. Chairman, the major developers in the city of Toronto by and large adopted that approach. They did not take their tenants through the hearings. But if you knock it down to six per cent you are going to force all those landlords to go to the rent review hearings.

Mr. Shore: You know it.

Mr. Grossman: And then what is going to happen? Exactly what the member for Wentworth says is happening. That the proof is in the pudding -- that 12 per cent is needed by a lot of people that are going through to the board.

Mr. Deans: No, no.

Mr. Grossman: That is the average. How many of them are going to end up getting 15 and 16 and 20 per cent? I can tell you a lot of them in my riding are going to the rent review board asking for eight and getting two. So there are a lot of people who, rather than being saved from going to the rent review board, are going to be forced to the rent review board. Instead of paying eight per cent more, they are going to be ending up with 12 per cent more.

Mr. Warner: Name them.

Mr. Deans: Minimum two per cent.

Mr. Grossman: And then we will be treated to the member for Ottawa Centre (Mr. Cassidy) -- who is probably out chasing down the Conservative candidate’s signs in the riding tonight -- coming back here and saying --

Mr. Lewis: He will be back. You are quite right.

Mr. Grossman: If he is back it will hardly be a treat. I used the wrong word, He will be back here and he will be rising and saying, “Do you know what the backlog is? Do you know what the delay is? Do you know what the cost of the administration of that programme is?”

Interjections.

Mr. Grossman: “You are forcing all these cases in there.” We’ll then permit him to stand on his hind legs in this assembly and say, “The whole procedure is too complex, there is an enormous backlog. You are spending public moneys. What you have to do is have six per cent, no appeals.” And boy, if we are still here then won’t that be even more attractive? That’s even a lower bid to the tenants than you are making tonight.

Interjection.

Mr. Grossman: It’ll be great stuff.

Mr. Kerrio: Now I know that you are going to stay in those back benches.

Mr. Grossman: But I’ll tell you what it won’t be. It won’t be fair to the tenants.

Interjection.

Mr. Grossman: It just won’t be fair to the tenants.

Interjection.

Mr. Grossman: Mr. Chairman, I’ll face my voters if the time comes and --

Mr. Kerrio: Wise choice.

Mr. Grossman: -- treat them as mature. I won’t try to bribe them, I’ll explain to them that there is a pass-through of costs. I’ll explain to them that our programme is and was responsible -- that we didn’t treat them as children. We didn’t go out passing out two per cent solutions.

Mr. S. Smith: That you lost, fair and square.

Mr. Grossman: And, Mr. Chairman, when we are back here --

An hon. member: If.

Mr. Grossman: -- we will be able in a few years to rise in this House and announce that a programme won’t be needed because the vacancy rate will have risen, which would be totally and --

Mr. Kerrio: That government will have to believe in tenants by then.

Mr. Grossman: -- completely impossible if the opposition were ever in control of this House.

An hon. member: No, no; never.

Mr. Grossman: Except for the possibility that if they did form the government enough people would leave this province to create enough vacancies.

Interjections.

Mr. Chairman: Order, please. Before I recognize --

Interjection.

Mr. Chairman: Order! Before I recognize the member for Riverdale, I would like to announce that seated in the Speaker’s gallery is a very distinguished guest and parliamentarian, the hon. Dr. Wahid Ali, who is president of the Senate of Trinidad and Tobago.

[Applause]

Mr. Renwick: Mr. Chairman --

Mr. Conway: Give us poetry.

Mr. Renwick: -- I would like to try to deal with a couple of matters that have been raised on the assumption that the “Dear Ian” and the “Dear Jim” letters from Bob had not been written. There is something quite unrealistic about what is happening in the Legislature tonight and I think we ought to now direct our attention away from whether or not there is going to be an election, which will be decided by the Premier and not by us, and to talk about whether or not the bill that we are going to pass and which will be law and which, regardless of electoral consequences or whether there is or is not an election, must be in place before May 1 in order to provide some sense of stability in this whole question of the rent review programme.

I want to address myself to the principle, as I see it, of what we are talking about. I want also to then try to address myself to the comment made by the minister when he used the term “gibberish”, if we go to our understanding of what the motion moved by the member for Perth is about. I would like to also address myself very briefly to what the member for Kitchener-Wilmot said, so far as I could understand the drift of his remarks when he was speaking.

As I understand it, the limits are quite narrow actually. It does make it a little bit ridiculous to think that we are talking in terms of confidence or no confidence in the government. The government’s position is eight per cent, or such lesser amount as may be determined by the Lieutenant Governor in Council. Our position on our amendment was six per cent or such lesser amount as could be determined by the Lieutenant Governor in Council. We are talking about a spread of two points.

We are all in agreement that a landlord or a tenant has recourse above the amount and the landlord and the tenant have protection on both sides under the review process. We all agree that after the trauma of starting up a review process, trying to iron out the bugs -- there are still bugs in it and some of our amendments are addressed toward making it even more realistic and workable -- we are all agreed that that is not the matter which is before us. We’re talking this very narrow limit of somewhere, and if I can leave aside the Lieutenant Governor in Council reducing the amount, we’re talking about eight per cent and six per cent.

[9:45]

The Liberal amendment agrees that it can’t be higher than eight per cent, because their amendment specifically says, “by the lesser of eight per cent or the rate of increase,” using the language which is in the Liberal amendment. So the Liberal Party and the Conservative Party are in agreement that the upper limit will be eight per cent. We think it should be six, so that significantly distinguishes us from the Liberal Party, unless of course they feel there’s some merit, after the intelligent debate that’s been put forward by members of this party, that they should change their position and support our amendment and withdraw their amendment. I know if they want to withdraw their amendment, my colleague, the member for Oshawa, could be prevailed upon to withdraw his subamendment. So we could be back to that basic argument.

The minister used the word “gibberish.” We tend to agree that the AIB programme as a whole is gibberish and I’m glad that he generally agrees with us about that matter. But I do believe there is a definable meaning possible, as we understand the Liberal amendment, which would bring in a figure -- not our six per cent -- but would have the effect of bringing in a figure somewhat above six but lower than eight.

That’s what we’re really talking about. You’re talking eight, we’re talking six, the Liberals are talking eight at the top or somewhere in between. The question now is, was the minister right in saying that the language used in the Liberal amendment is gibberish and would make an unworkable law? I want the minister please to address himself to this question if he feels there is any further problem about it.

Our understanding is that the Liberal amendment says, “the lesser of eight per cent or the rate of increase for compensation allowed under the basic protection factor and national productivity factor as outlined in part 4 of The Anti-Inflation Act Guidelines for Canada.” I take that to mean the basic protection factor as indicated in paragraph 46 of the guidelines, and I take the national productivity factor to be as stated in paragraph 47 of the guidelines.

We can set the national productivity factor aside because that’s a specified percentage. The guidelines state: “47. National productivity factor -- The national productivity factor for a guideline year is two per cent.” So that’s a fixed amount.

If I could turn to the basic protection factor as set out in paragraph 46 and deal with the third programme year which is the programme year starting on October 14, 1977, the basic protection factor at that time is the aggregate of four per cent, which is a definite amount, and a second amount that is a formula but indefinite, and that is, and I quote: “The amount, if any, by which the percentage increase in the consumer price index during the second programme year exceeds six per cent.”

So you have a definitive amount that can be calculated for use in the third year -- that is the year starting October 14, 1977 -- calculated upon the consumer price index during the second programme year, which is the year that will end on October 13, 1977. So that it would have seemed to us as we tried to understand the Liberal amendment, that it is not gibberish; it is a readily calculable amount, namely, two per cent for national productivity, basic protection factor of four per cent, making six per cent, plus this calculation based on the consumer price index for the year which would end October 13, 1977.

Hon. Mr. Handleman: Read the calculation and see if it’s not gibberish. Everybody should read it. Read the calculation of the experience adjustment.

Mr. Deans: He’s read it.

Mr. Lewis: The experience adjustment factor --

Mr. Kerrio: That’s not gibberish at all. If you can’t figure it out, they’d probably figure it for you.

Mr. Sweeney: Only if it exceeds six per cent.

Mr. Renwick: I’m glad that the minister interjected with that, because that’s the misunderstanding I want to clear up.

If you will note, in the Liberal amendment, the reference is to base protection factor and national productivity factors as they affect the rate of increase for compensation.

Mr. Lewis: Right.

Mr. Renwick: But it does not refer in any way to the experience adjustment factor.

Mr. Lewis: Exactly.

Mr. Renwick: I think that we’ve got to spend just a little bit of time to make certain that our understanding, which has been thrown into question by the minister, is the Liberal understanding of what their amendment is saying. Our understanding is that the Liberal amendment says the lesser of eight per cent or the calculation of four per cent basic protection factor, two per cent national productivity factor, plus the amount, if any, by which the percentage increase in the consumer price index during the second programme year exceeds six per cent; and that’s somewhere between six and eight per cent, unless it happened that the consumer price index calculation was nil, in which case it would be a low of six per cent and a top of eight per cent. It’s probably somewhere in between that, but lesser than eight.

Mr. Bullbrook: You’re right on.

Mr. Nixon: I think you got that right.

Mr. Renwick: The minister threw in the word “gibberish” and he has again interjected the experience adjustment factor. I agree and everyone would agree -- and I would like confirmation from the Liberal Party -- that the experience adjustment factor is not included in the calculation which they were proposing.

Mr. Good: If it were in, it would be in the amendment. Do you see it in the amendment?

Mr. Nixon: It’s not in the amendment.

Mr. Bullbrook: Can you read?

Mr. Renwick: Well -- yes, I can read.

Mr. Bullbrook: Well, it’s not in the amendment.

Mr. S. Smith: You were right the first time.

Mr. Bullbrook: Sir Toby, we’d put it in if we wanted it in.

Mr. Renwick: Mr. Chairman, I want to assure the member for Sarnia that, yes, I can read. I’m rather poor at mathematics.

Mr. Bullbrook: That’s true.

Interjections.

Mr. Renwick: I think where the minister is, perhaps, having trouble -- I’m obviously not having trouble, but I want the minister to understand --

Mr. Kerrio: I think he’s getting it now.

Mr. Renwick: -- because you have to live with the Liberals long enough before you understand them and I’ve lived with them for a long, long time so I can understand them. I know the minister can’t.

Hon. Mr. Taylor: You lived with the Tories for a while too, didn’t you?

Mr. Renwick: The problem with the Liberal amendment in interpretation is that they used the phrase “rate of increase for compensation.”

Mr. Bullbrook: That’s right.

Mr. Renwick: Therefore, the minister looked at paragraph 45 of the guidelines and the minister made the mistake -- and, of course, we made the same mistake when we first looked at it -- that the calculations that had to be made were the result obtained from the two calculations taking into account the basic protection factor which is four per cent plus the consumer price index part, the national productivity factor which is the two per cent, and the experience adjustment factor for the year as set out under section 48 of the guidelines.

I would agree 100 per cent that we couldn’t possibly put into the Act a provision with respect to the rate of increase in compensation if the three factors were involved: the basic protection factor, the national productivity factor and the experience adjustment factor, because (a) the experience adjustment factor is a very complicated formula and because (b) the result of that factor will not be known for a considerable period after October 14, 1977.

So I’m pleased, because of the interjections made by Mr. Edighoffer and some of his colleagues for the Liberal Party, that their understanding is the same as our understanding as to what their amendment means. Therefore, it’s not gibberish and it does have a clearly defined meaning, and while we would like to have six per cent, we want, if possible, to get agreement on an amendment which will bring down the eight per cent.

Mr. Lewis: Right.

Mr. Renwick: The reason we want to bring down the eight per cent -- and I am not going to attempt to elucidate the clarity of the presentation made by the leader of the party when he dealt with the figures that are involved. I just wanted to say to the member for Kitchener-Wilmot that there was no great argument up to the point where the member for Kitchener-Wilmot went a little bit hysterical.

The realistic net impact on rent increase as we show it is 7.05 per cent, taking into account the two reductions which we made of administrative costs and fuel costs. I think the point which the member for Kitchener-Wilmot missed was that that was based on total operating costs of 55 per cent as the portion of operating costs to rent. We, on the basis of both the British Columbia study -- which we admit is dated in 1975 --

Mr. Sweeney: It’s on a different base too.

Mr. Renwick: It may well be, but then, as the leader of this party said, we checked with Central Mortgage and Housing Corporation for its overall figure in the public and the private field of housing in which it is involved, and it was using figures for operating costs of 42 and 45 per cent. Therefore, we reduced the 55 per cent to 46.2 because that was the BC figure, to 45 per cent, because that was one of the CMH figures, to 42 per cent, because that was the other CMHC figure. By those reductions we brought the 7.05 down. Using the 46.2 per cent brings it down to 5.92, using 45 per cent brings it down to 5.77 and using 42 per cent brings it down to 5.38. It was on the basis of that calculation --

Mr. Sweeney: Can you explain that to tenants?

Mr. Lewis: We don’t have to; just the government.

Mr. Renwick: -- that we arrived at the decision that the proper base is six per cent, and we believe the proper base should be six per cent at August 1. We don’t believe that the adjustment should wait until October 14, but as we understand the Liberal amendment, they will go with eight per cent from August 1 to October 14. On October 14 it will either be eight per cent or something less, but probably not six per cent on the basis of the basic protection factor and the national productivity factor as set out in sections 46 and 47 of the guidelines.

Mr. Sweeney: And that’s fair to both sides.

Mr. Renwick: That’s our understanding, and I did hope that I answered your question about gibberish by saying that we just simply do not consider that there is any need to take into account this very complicated additional factor of the experience adjustment factor.

Hon. Mr. Handleman: Mr. Chairman, I just wonder if I could deal briefly with these figures, because a great deal of them have been bandied around. First of all, the average wage increase is said to be six per cent. The figure for 1976 is 9.8. The average wage increase, according to the figures that we have available for the first quarter of 1977, indicates an average wage increase of eight per cent, notwithstanding the AIB guidelines. We have not tied our figures to that. I just want to mention some of the calculations that are going to have to be done if the Liberal amendment carries, because --

Mr. Sweeney: You only have to do it once.

Hon. Mr. Handleman: -- while it’s been mentioned that it will take effect on October 14, in fact, Statistics Canada issues the October consumer price index, which is a necessary component of the calculation, on November 15, after which the Anti-Inflation Board staff are in a position to do the following calculation -- Mr. Chairman, if this isn’t gibberish, I don’t know what is: What they do is they calculate the required percentage increase in the CPI for the second programme year by subtracting the October 1976 figure from the October 1977 figure, dividing the result by the October 1976 figure and multiplying the quotient by 100 per cent.

[10:00]

Mr. Bullbrook: You agreed to that.

Mr. Sweeney: Don’t you have anybody over there who knows how to do that?

Hon. Mr. Handleman: In any case, the October 1977 CPI figure --

Mr. Bullbrook: You agreed to that. You signed an agreement.

Mr. Chairman: Order, please. The member for Sarnia will please be silent.

Mr. Bullbrook: I just wanted to tell them they agreed to it. They have an agreement right there. They agreed to that “gibberish.”

An hon. member: You’ve given your last speech.

Mr. Chairman: I’ll recognize you next.

Mr. Bullbrook: I apologize.

Hon. Mr. Handleman: Mr. Chairman, the fact remains that not until November 15 will the Anti-Inflation Board staff be able to start calculating the figure that is required for the Liberal amendment to become workable. If a landlord doesn’t know that until November 15, which is the first day he can possibly know it, if he has to give notice under our Act, he would have to give notice for something like March 1, 1978. I ask the member for Perth to consider that in any possible reworking he may be doing of his amendment, if it’s going to be passed, it will not be workable if it goes into effect on October 14, 1977. You would have to be able to give notice at least 90 days after November 15, which is the first day you’ll know it.

Mr. Chairman: Will you please turn the television lights off, please? It’s starting to bother some of the members. You can turn them back on again if there seems to be any obvious reason for doing so.

Mr. Good: It’s certainly regrettable, in my view, Mr. Chairman, that the Premier and the government have used the debate on these amendments for such other purposes than the actual debate on amendments here tonight. It’s the second time within less than two weeks they have used an occasion to try to do something other than debate the matter before the House.

The anti-inflation guideline tie-in, I think, is a very reasonable and sensible approach to the whole matter. Setting the rate at eight per cent had its merits at the time and, while there was a tremendous backlog of appeals before the rent review officers, once the initial numbers were cleared away we find now that there is a pretty steady flow. Many offices across the province have been partly wound down in that the number of cases before the rent review officers has declined a great deal.

The purpose of tying the allowable increase without rent review to the anti-inflation guidelines is a very practical one. People whose wages have been tied to guidelines, whose employment contracts have been probably cut back or agreed to when they were tied in with the anti-inflation guidelines, can understand if their rent is allowed to increase by the same amount. People do not keep constantly aware of the day-by-day or month-to-month inflation factors in our province or in our country. They do, however, realize that somewhere down in Ottawa a group known as the Anti-Inflation Board has at its disposal a figure that represents the inflationary factor in our country and that is kept constantly updated. People can then relate to that figure and feel that if that is what the legislation says and that is what the landlord is asking for, it must indeed be a reasonable increase.

The member for Riverdale explained to the House how this factor would work. Having presented this amendment some several days ago, we thought the purpose of this amendment would be figured out by both the NDP and the government long before this evening. We understood what it is and it is absolutely ridiculous that the minister should say this particular factor would not work and could not be applied. If eight per cent can be applied or six per cent can be applied, a percentage that you would get if we took the trouble to phone Ottawa to the Anti-Inflation Board -- and they would give it to you on any particular date you want -- if you can’t figure it out then I say all you have to do is get it from Ottawa and they’d figure it out for you.

Hon. Mr. Handleman: They can’t figure it out.

Mr. Good: All right. The figures that the minister gave us this afternoon in trying to justify an eight per cent increase may, in some instances, be correct. I don’t know. To me they look somewhat cooked.

Hon. Mr. Handleman: Come on.

Mr. Good: I have taken figures on a few apartment complexes that I had at my disposal.

Mr. Kerrio: Your man Miller said it.

Mr. Nixon: They look cooked to me too. Self-serving figures.

Mr. Good: For the two I looked at, property tax did not take 25 per cent of the revenue produced by the particular apartment building. Administration costs took only a fraction of nine per cent which you have allocated to administration costs. Your fuel cost, in one instance, was considerably lower at seven per cent than the actual percentage. While you may have got these figures from 125,000 units which came before the rent review officers, let me remind the minister that the cases coming before the rent review office do not represent a general cross-section of the apartment buildings in the province. They had exceptional expenses or they wouldn’t be before a rent review officer. That’s how you got these cooked-up figures.

I am not prepared to say what the figures should be, but I certainly think that most people in the province would agree that a figure which is tied to our anti-inflation guidelines would be a correct figure to allow. The anti-inflation guidelines as referred to in the amendment are actually regulations under the anti-inflation Act and are referred to, as I understand it, in their short title as anti-inflation guidelines. So the minister may be quite correct -- the word “Act” should come out of there and it would be anti-inflation guidelines under the anti-inflation Act which I think would correct his big objection to that particular figure.

I suggest the minister and the government have tunnel vision on this matter. They don’t want to see anything but their own side of the story, and as far as I am concerned, it is immoral that the Premier should send a letter and try to say that this is a matter of deep confidence whether or not the landlords in this province get another two per cent or whether they don’t get it. They still can get it if they are entitled to it. All they have to do is make an application before the rent review officer. To suggest that that is any kind of tie-in with confidence is absolutely ridiculous. The truth of it is the Premier is all dressed up, and he has no place to go unless he can provoke the Opposition into forcing him to do something.

Mr. Deputy Chairman: The hon. member for Grey-Bruce.

Hon. Mr. Henderson: Are you supporting us, Eddie?

Hon. Mr. Rhodes: The voice of reason.

Hon. B. Stephenson: The voice of what?

Mr. Sargent: Mr. Chairman, the minister has threatened to resign from his department if the government extended the rent controls. He said he couldn’t live with them. You know he is the same fellow that is rumoured to have said that he would rather commit adultery than drink beer in the Blue Jay ball park. Well, who wouldn’t?

Mr. Nixon: Did you say that, Sidney?

Mr. Reid: Sid doesn’t have that much sense of humour.

Mr. Breithaupt: Always making choices difficult.

Mr. Sargent: So he’s dragging his feet in this department and the people of Ontario are going to suffer for it. Of all the people in the economy the Premier wants to take a whack at the people who rent.

Mr. Sweeney: After the unemployed.

Mr. Sargent: He singles out those people who can’t afford to own their own homes and says, even though we have hundreds of thousands of our people out of work, we won’t give these people who can’t afford a home to buy, we are going to single them out and whack them. We are still going to give them an eight per cent increase in their rents. He wants to be responsible to the developers and landlords. On the other hand, the Treasurer, on the tax reform Act, said it wouldn’t be smart politics to bring this legislation into being before an election. So you are playing both sides of the street.

Hon. B. Stephenson: When? What has he been reading now, Playboy?

An hon. member: Listen, Bette.

Hon. B. Stephenson: I was listening.

Mr. Deputy Chairman: Order, please.

Mr. Sargent: All you do is read your own speeches, Bette. That’s why you wouldn’t know that.

Mr. Deputy Chairman: Will the hon. member direct his comments to the amendment to the amendment?

Mr. Shore: Which bill are you speaking on?

Mr. Sargent: Mr. Chairman, the rental accommodation in this province is non-existent. The Minister of Housing has done a disgraceful job in supplying low cost housing in this province.

Mr. Reid: Any housing.

Mr. Sargent: Over the years, as I’ve stood in my place in this House, the big developers have had the ear of the government. Last year we had the big developers crying in their beer in our caucus; one man had 10,000 doors, he said -- he had 10,000 apartments and we’re supposed to feel sorry for him because of this.

Mr. Nixon: I must have missed that meeting.

Mr. Sargent: They’ve all taken their funds and they’ve fled south and there’s no more rental accommodation available. But those who are lucky to have the houses, you’re going to whack them at a time when they need some help. Fifty per cent of our people rent homes and there will always be renters.

Hon. Mr. Handleman: Call him to order, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. Sargent: Because the simple fact of life in Ontario today is that 50 per cent of the people in this greatest province in the world will never own their own home in their lifetime. The system under Premier Bill Davis --

Mr. S. Smith: The biggest disgrace of this government is the housing.

Hon. Mr. Handleman: Order, Mr. Chairman. Order. This is not second reading.

Mr. Sargent: -- is a system where no man will ever be allowed to build a home he can afford.

Hon. Mr. Rhodes: Make him speak to the amendment.

Mr. Sargent: I’m speaking to the amendment all right, John.

Interjection.

Mr. Deputy Chairman: Order please.

Hon. Mr. Handleman: Mr. Chairman, on a point of order. There was ample opportunity -- two evenings and one afternoon -- to speak on the principle of this bill. The hon. member had his chance then; he was not here. I suggest he stick to this amendment.

Mr. S. Smith: When we talk about your lack of housing policy, it hurts.

Mr. Deputy Chairman: The Chair was under the impression that he was speaking to the amendment. Would he continue?

Mr. Kerrio: How’s that, John?

Mr. Sargent: You’re playing the numbers game with us under the guise of confidence.

Mr. Shore: You’re the best numbers guy there is, Eddie, you know that.

Mr. Sargent: We’ve got good numbers over here -- and they can’t buy us over there.

Mr. Deputy Chairman: Order, please. Will the hon. member --

An hon. member: You asked for that, Marv.

Interjections.

Hon. Mr. Rhodes: You have been for sale since day one. Don’t start something you can’t finish.

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

Mr. Sargent: And the Minister of Housing, he has his price too. A great Liberal -- they bought you too.

Hon. Mr. Rhodes: Any time you are ready, I will talk about you too. Want me to show your pamphlets?

Mr. Yakabuski: So has the Downtowner got its price. It’s big.

Mr. Deputy Chairman: Order, please. The hon. member is now not speaking to the amendment. Will he return to the subject matter.

Mr. Sargent: In maintaining their position of eight per cent, the Premier says that this bill --

Interjections.

Mr. Deputy Chairman: Order, please.

Hon. Mr. Rhodes: Want me to show your pamphlets, Eddie?

Mr. Kerrio: He struck a nerve, eh, John?

Hon. Mr. Rhodes: You ditch-digger, don’t talk to me.

Mr. Kerrio: Get that, Hansard?

Interjections.

Mr. Sargent: The Premier says that this legislation that’s put in by the opposition tonight is prejudicing the tenants -- this amendment is going to prejudice the tenants in Ontario. How in the hell can you intimidate a man when he can’t pay his rent?

Mr. Shore: He is out of order, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. Deputy Chairman: Order, please.

Mr. Sargent: I’m concerned that in Owen Sound we have hundreds of apartments, which is German money, and one man has control of the ghettos in Owen Sound -- one man -- and they’re whacking these people --

Mr. Yakabuski: When did you get control, Eddie?

Hon. B. Stephenson: Eddie Sargent!

An hon. member: That’ll make good reading --

Mr. Sargent: Those are the people who can’t pay their rents and you’re going to allow an eight per cent increase to this German landlord.

Mr. Deputy Chairman: Order, please. The hon. member is straying now from the amendment to the amendment. Would he kindly return to it?

Mr. Drea: Mr. Chairman, on a point of order. In the name of decency in the House have that last remark stricken about the racial origin of the landlord. Just on a matter of decency.

Mr. Sargent: Thank you, Frank, I will withdraw that. I’m sorry.

Mr. Yakabuski: And all the rest.

Mr. Sargent: But that’s all, though. That’s all.

An hon. member: Frank, that is the first thing you’ve done in eight years. You should be a chief justice of the Supreme Court.

Hon. Mr. Handleman: He’s an embarrassment to the House.

Mr. Deputy Chairman: The hon. member will continue.

Mr. Sargent: Our response is tied to the AIB, which in effect could be six per cent and could go as low as four per cent.

This government has money. It had $100 million to give to Syncrude as a token payment -- $100 million of our money to Syncrude, that’ll happen not in our lifetime.

Hon. B. Stephenson: Don’t you want to have any energy left in the next 20 years?

Mr. Sargent: Do you want to speak?

Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order, please. The hon. member will ignore the interjections and interruptions and continue.

Mr. Sargent: I can’t ignore her.

Mr. Grossman: You’re away off base, Ed.

Mr. Sargent: And look who’s talking -- Mr. Grossman there. We spent $141 million of our money on the Spadina Expressway to elect his father and now we’re giving money to re-elect him.

[10:15]

Mr. Deputy Chairman: Order, please. The hon. member will return to the amendment.

Mr. Grossman: Shows what a good local member can do, Eddie.

An hon. member: What did you get, Eddie?

Mr. Deputy Chairman: The hon. member will direct his comments to the amendment to the amendment.

An hon. member: He’s being provocative.

Mr. Sargent: He was provocative; yes, he was.

Mr. Kerrio: Is that true, Larry?

Mr. Sargent: In summation, what we have is a complete numbers game, with people who can’t fight back. Or maybe they will on election day.

Hon. Mr. Rhodes: I am going to be very brief in my remarks --

Mr. Reid: Hear, hear.

Hon. Mr. Rhodes: You may be grateful. After listening to the previous speaker, who I assume was speaking in support of the amendment proposed by his party -- although it was hard to tell from his remarks --

Mr. Sargent: If you’d kept quiet for a minute, you would have found out.

Hon. Mr. Rhodes: I would like to draw your attention, Mr. Chairman, and to the attention of the House, page 685 of Hansard for November 18, 1975. I would like to quote remarks made by the hon. member for Grey-Bruce at that time during the debate on the rent review bill.

Mr. Sweeney: What’s that got to do with the amendment?

Hon. Mr. Rhodes: It has all kinds of things to do with the amendment.

Mr. Breithaupt: On a point of order --

Hon. Mr. Rhodes: Oh, we’re not going to have a point of order.

Interjections.

Hon. Mr. Rhodes: I intend to get back to the amendment, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. Deputy Chairman: Order, please.

Mr. Breithaupt: On a point of order, Mr. Chairman, there are others who have been called to order by the Chair with respect to comments that they might have preferred to make on the initial legislation which was passed by this House some two years ago. If the minister is going to be referring to comments that might have been made in dealing with a bill at a certain point in time, then surely that is an opportunity available to all members.

An hon. member: Right.

Mr. Deputy Chairman: Order, please. The point is well taken. The hon. minister should direct his comments to the amendment to the amendment before us at the present time.

Mr. Nixon: That’s the end of your speech, John. You might as well sit down.

Mr. S. Smith: Nice try.

Hon. Mr. Rhodes: With the greatest of respect, Mr. Chairman, the hon. member was speaking --

Mr. Nixon: Are you debating his ruling? Are you going to appeal it?

Mr. S. Smith: Why don’t you appeal it?

Mr. Grossman: What are you worried about?

Hon. Mr. Rhodes: I am speaking to the point of order.

Mr. Breithaupt: There is no point of order. The decision has already been made by the Chair.

Hon. Mr. Rhodes: Mr. Chairman, are you telling me I cannot proceed in this way? Is that what you’re telling me?

Mr. Deputy Chairman: Order, please. The hon. member can’t hear the hon. member for Sault Ste. Marie.

Hon. Mr. Rhodes: Mr. Chairman, are you saying that I am out of order to read the comments that are part of my position?

Mr. Deputy Chairman: I said that you are out of order to read verbatim from Hansard, referring to a debate some years ago. If you wish to relate it to the amendment in brevity, that would be in order.

Hon. Mr. Rhodes: You may rest assured, Mr. Chairman, that I do not intend to read eight or 10 pages; I wish to read one paragraph as part of the debate on this amendment.

Mr. Reid: It is out of context.

Hon. Mr. Rhodes: Wait until he hears it.

Mr. Sweeney: You wouldn’t let me speak on the original bill.

Interjections.

Mr. Deputy Chairman: Order, please. The Chair will listen and then make the decision.

Hon. Mr. Rhodes: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I indicated I would be very brief, but on November 18, 1975, the hon. member for Grey-Bruce said: “The eight per cent guideline here is suicide for the people who have their money invested in apartments when they’re doing the refinancing. This is a fact. I’m not going to get into any argument about whether or not I am right or wrong. This is a fact.” He went on to say --

Mr. Sargent: On a point of order, Mr. Chairman --

Hon. Mr. Rhodes: -- “I want to tell you, sir, 200,000 or 300,000 appeals immediately.”

Mr. Deputy Chairman: Order. The hon. member has risen on a point of order. Would he state his point of order?

Mr. Sargent: Mr. Chairman, that was a fact in 1975; it was true. But it’s not true today.

Hon. Mr. Rhodes: I was out of order, Mr. Chairman. Thank you, sir.

Mr. Deputy Chairman: Order, please. Are you ready for the question? The hon. member for Peel South wishes to comment.

Mr. Kennedy: For a couple of minutes.

Interjections.

Mr. Kennedy: Look, you fellows have prattled away since this bill was introduced and half the evening tonight.

Mr. Nixon: I feel a speech coming on.

Mr. Kennedy: I have in excess of 50 per cent of the people in my riding in rental accommodation, and I think I should have a moment to express their views and speak on behalf of them.

Mr. Reid: Here comes a believer in the AIB.

Mr. Kennedy: When the original bill was introduced, I did a considerable canvass of the people in my riding. What they were disturbed about was the 20, 30, 40 and 50 per cent increases. They said they would happily live with eight, 10 or 12 per cent.

Mr. S. Smith: Oh, are we going up to 12?

Mr. Kennedy: We came in at eight per cent. It was accepted.

Mr. Sweeney: It’s going up to 12 if you guys come back in again.

Mr. Kennedy: All our people are expecting is a continuation of the rent review programme -- not rent control as the members opposite would have; interminably, indefinitely rent control. I put this on the record, that they would accept this on the basis of a continuation in accordance with the bill.

I go abroad as Trudeau did, to Washington. I happened to be in Washington too, where they have rent control, not rent review. The Washington Post statement is, “no rental apartment construction has taken place in that city since 1973.”

Mr. Ruston: That is not in this amendment.

Mr. Kennedy: The members opposite do a disservice to our tenants when they proclaim that rent control should be instituted and should go on indefinitely.

Mr. Deputy Chairman: Order, please. Speak to the amendment.

Mr. Kennedy: So I’m in support of the bill as presented by the minister.

Mr. Breithaupt: Mr. Chairman, before the Solicitor General starts taking orders, we are prepared to proceed at this time with the taking of the vote with respect to these two particular amendments so that further amendments can be dealt with another time by the House.

Hon. Mr. Handleman: Before taking the vote, I wonder if I could ask the member for Perth if he’s prepared to make the correction to the title which was suggested, I believe, by the member for Waterloo North, who suggested that in fact our statement to you was correct -- that you had used the wrong name of the Act in your amendment, which would make it unworkable.

Mr. Nixon: Are you going to vote for it if it’s changed?

Hon. Mr. Handleman: I suggest it would be much more orderly if the member who moved the amendment would correct it.

Mr. Nixon: Then you’re going to vote for it?

Hon. Mr. Handleman: No.

Mr. Deputy Chairman: Order, please. We understand the hon. member has informed the Chair that the wording should read “Part 4 of the Anti-Inflation Guidelines.”

Mr. Nixon: Now you’re going to support it? You’re going to support it?

Mr. Bullbrook: What kind of chicken game is that?

[10:45]

The committee divided on Mr. Breaugh’s amendment to subsection 1 of section 1, which was negatived on the following vote:

Ayes 29; nays 72.

Mr. Lewis: Why are you fighting this campaign against the tenants of Ontario?

The committee divided on Mr. Breaugh’s amendment to Mr. Edighoffer’s amendment to subsection 1 of section 1, which was negatived on the following vote:

Ayes 29; nays 72.

The committee divided on Mr. Edighoffer’s amendment to subsection 1 of section 1, which was approved on the following vote:

Ayes 54; nays 47.

Subsection 1 of section 1, as amended, agreed to.

Hon. Mr. Welch: Mr. Chairman, we’ve been giving some consideration in consultation with the other House leaders as to how we might deal with the balance of the bill because of the late hour, and I’d like an understanding that we have unanimous consent to proceed tomorrow. I’d like to make sure that we have unanimous consent to proceed tomorrow as follows: --

Interjections.

Mr. Deputy Chairman: Order, please. The hon. House leader will continue.

Hon. Mr. Welch: I wouldn’t want to disappoint you at this late hour. I would remind you that we’re still in committee. You still have a chance to look after things when we get to third reading of the bill.

On the understanding that we’ll proceed to deal with three private bills that will be on the order paper tomorrow -- Pr8, Pr21 and Pr27 -- we will --

Mr. Sargent: What are you shaking about?

Hon. Mr. Welch: I’m shaking because I still haven’t got over your contribution to the debate tonight. I think the Minister of Housing really laid you low tonight. There’s no doubt about that.

Mr. Bullbrook: He’ll rise again.

Hon. Mr. Welch: Yes. We’ll then go back into committee of the whole House to complete the consideration of this bill and then we come out of committee on the understanding we will have unanimous consent to give the bill third reading and royal assent. So, we are agreeing to suspend the other order previously announced with respect to the budget debate.

Mr. Breithaupt: Agreed.

Hon. Mr. Welch: On that understanding, I’d like to move that the committee rise and report.

On motion by Hon. Mr. Welch, the committee of the whole House reported progress.

Mr. Lewis: Whatever happened to the Ministry of Northern Affairs?

Mr. Speaker: In accordance with standing order 27(g) and provisional order 4, we have certain matters to deal with at this time. If you want to dispense, you may leave but we have to go on with this business. So therefore, in accordance with standing order 28(a), I deem a motion to adjourn to have been made.

POINT OF PRIVILEGE

Mr. Deans: Mr. Speaker, on a point of personal privilege I suppose, I was informed the Treasure would not be available this evening to discuss the matter that I raised and I would ask that my particular matter be set over to Tuesday next.

Mr. Speaker: Is that agreed?

Hon. Mr. McKeough: If the member is not prepared to proceed, then I certainly give my permission.

Mr. Deans: Mr. Speaker, on the basis of that interjection, I am happy to proceed.

Mr. Speaker: Thank you. We are all happy then.

GROUP HOME PLACEMENTS

Mr. Speaker: The member for Bellwoods was dissatisfied with the answer given by a certain minister. He may have five minutes to explain his point of view.

Mr. McClellan: Mr. Speaker, may I wait for about a minute until the din of the House clears?

Mr. Hodgson: Proceed, proceed.

Mr. McClellan: Well, I will proceed. The context of my question to the Minister of Community and Social Services first needs to be briefly delineated.

Mr. Speaker: Order, please. I request those who are leaving to leave as quietly as possible please. Thank you.

Mr. McClellan: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Because of the chaos in children’s services in this province, the family courts began placing children directly under authority of The Juvenile Delinquents Act, thus bypassing the entire shambles of Ontario’s existing child care service system. On April 21, Judge Holland delivered a decision in the Supreme Court which appears to have invalidated that process.

My question today was a direct appeal to the minister. I was supported in that by questions from the Liberal leader and by the member for St. George (Mrs. Campbell) for some answers to the dilemma that Judge Holland’s decision has posed to us and to the new crisis that child welfare services in this province had been thrown into as a result of that decision. We spoke specifically about the problem of a young girl placed in a group home, Youth Sphere, which was on Tuesday ruled invalid as a result of Judge Holland’s decision.

The minister did not answer my question. He did not answer the Liberal leader’s question. He did not answer the member for St. George’s question. That has become a pattern.

This minister was appointed to solve the problems and the chaos, the scandal and the shambles and the disaster in children’s services in this province. The so-called solution was presented to us on April 4 in the policy statement. Strangely, details were absent in that document. In fact not one single concrete solution to one single problem has been addressed so far to date by this minister, and today’s answer was just the latest in this series of evasions by this minister.

If you want to walk through the rubble of the April 4 policy edifice, I invite you and the members of this House to read the Hansard reports of the social development estimates for Monday and Tuesday of this week. Under questioning from myself and the member for St. George (Mrs. Campbell) that policy balloon of April 4 collapsed under the weight of its own hot air.

[11:00]

Secondly, we have in the last few weeks had the devastating revelations of the application brief for a judicial inquiry into the administration of The Child Welfare Act, and we have had no answers yet from this minister and no action and no decision.

Thirdly, a very real crisis has now emerged as a result of Judge Holland’s decision, which threatens hundreds of placements of children who are currently in group homes and makes it impossible for adequate child welfare arrangements to be made for future children.

I remind you. Mr. Speaker, that the so-called reforms are not in place and that the so-called timetable the minister announced for implementation has fallen apart under questioning. What is called for now is leadership and some decisive action. We have made a concrete suggestion to this minister, that if he picked up 100 per cent of the costs it would be possible for family court judges to continue to place children under the authority of The Juvenile Delinquents Act until such time as the reforms promised are in place; and we anticipate that that will be some two to three years.

In the meantime, there is a terrible hiatus, there is a complete vacuum of adequate arrangements and provisions of child care services. Instead of answers, instead of decisions, instead of leadership, we have had smiles and shrugs and “I don’t know” and “I don’t agree” and “I wasn’t told by my staff” and “I don’t know what happened at the meeting today with the municipalities.” In summary, “I don’t know what to do” is what this minister is telling us. We are now right back where we started when the inter-ministry report was revealed to us in December. The shambles remains, with the difference that the situation is now worse as a result of the Holland decision and we still do not have, from this government, an answer to what it proposes to do.

The reason I have brought the minister here tonight is to invite him to give us, for once in his brief ministry, a coherent answer, a coherent suggestion, a coherent proposal about what he is planning to do.

Mr. Speaker: The hon. minister has five minutes now.

Hon. Mr. Norton: Mr. Speaker, I’m not sure that I’ll require five minutes. Perhaps part of the misunderstanding that has existed between the hon. member opposite and myself is that he has difficulty in formulating his questions. When he raised the question with me earlier this afternoon, it was my understanding that he prefaced it by saying, “Don’t you agree that ...” and my response, essentially, was no, because I did not agree with the proposition that he put forward to me at that time that the simplest resolution and the obvious resolution was for the province of Ontario to pay 100 per cent of the costs of the placement of the children in question.

It seems to me the hon. member has a rather excessively simplistic concept of the kind of problem that is faced in Ontario with respect to children’s services. If, in fact, he is suggesting that all the problems we might face in the area of children’s areas, and particularly those that result from the decision of the Supreme Court recently, can be resolved by a simple decision to pay 100 per cent, then I disagree with him. That is what I indicated this afternoon when I said no. I have said it three times to him in the House already.

Mr. McClellan: Tell us what you’re going to do.

Mr. Speaker: Order, please. Only the hon. minister has the floor.

Hon. Mr. Norton: May I suggest to him that the solution to that problem is not something that can be simplistically decided unilaterally. It involves the communities across this province, it involves the government of Ontario, it involves the courts of Ontario, it involves the Children’s Aid Societies of Ontario. His solution is as simplistic as every solution that his party puts forward in this House.

Ms. Gigantes: What is your answer?

Interjections.

Hon. Mr. Norton: Listen to me for just one moment -- give me an opportunity to respond. Since that decision was made I have been engaged in consultation with all the parties I just mentioned, and I am pleased to announce, to this House, as I did this afternoon, that I have received great cooperation from all of those parties concerned. The welfare of the children of Ontario, I can assure you, is in good hands in terms of those people that I have spoken about.

Interjections.

Mr. Speaker: Order, please.

Hon. Mr. Norton: No child in this province will suffer as a result of that decision. The decision has been made that the decision of the court will be appealed. In the interim, certain undertakings have been made. One of those is that the municipalities will continue to respond to the orders that preceded the decision. The other is that for the intervening period, I will seek through consultation with my colleagues to provide for interim financing. That is yet to be determined. I will be in a position to announce that in the very near future.

However, I don’t anticipate that will be 100 per cent. I will not support 100 per cent, and let me tell the member why: Because it is fundamental to the difference in the philosophy between his party and mine. Its members are always shouting about what economic control means. If 100 per cent support were to come from the province of Ontario, essentially the decisions would have to be made centrally and at the provincial level in this province with respect to the care of children. That is not something I’m prepared to accept.

It is the purpose of this government to return the responsibility wherever possible, in co-operation with local authorities, to the local community. We will pursue that as long as I am minister in this portfolio.

Mr. McClellan: You are wrong, you are wrong.

Hon. Mr. Norton: I am not wrong. You are misled--

Mr. Speaker: Order, please. Thirty seconds left.

Hon. Mr. Norton: You are misled, and you are engaged in a headlong effort to mislead the people of the province of Ontario.

Mr. McClellan: That is not true.

Hon. Mr. Norton: The resolution of this problem, I can assure you, which will be announced within the next three or four days, will be one --

Mr. Speaker: The hon. minister’s time has expired. Thank you.

Mr. MacDonald: You should withdraw that remark.

Mr. McClellan: On a point of privilege, I didn’t want to interrupt and take away from his time. But I would ask you to instruct the minister to withdraw the remarks about “on a headlong course to mislead the province.”

Mr. Speaker: It is against the rules of this House to accuse another of misleading the House.

Mr. McClellan: Well, let’s not play games with this, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker: I think perhaps upon reconsideration, it is imputing a motive to the hon. member, and I would ask the minister to withdraw those words.

Hon. Mr. Norton: Mr. Speaker, I will amend my comments so that they might read, with the exception of the members of the Legislative Assembly of the province of Ontario.

Mr. Speaker: No, no -- I want the words having to do with misleading withdrawn, please.

Hon. Mr. Norton: I am sorry, Mr. Speaker. I thought that those members of the House already were probably misled --

Mr. Speaker: No, I’m talking about misleading anybody.

Hon. Mr. Norton: I shall at your request withdraw that.

Mr. Speaker: Thank you. To make myself clear -- it was the motive that was imputed that I wished to have withdrawn.

LICENCE FEES

Mr. Speaker: Now we will hear from the hon. member for Timiskaming who had a question of the hon. Minister of Transportation and Communications, I believe.

Mr. Bain: Mr. Speaker, in what may or may not turn out to be the dying days of this Parliament, I can realize that with the time constraints of the question period today, when I just got the question in and the minister barely had a chance to give an answer, he may not have had an opportunity to present as full an answer as he might have liked to. I am afraid the answer that he did give could cause some considerable difficulty and that is why I wish clarification.

The $10 licence plate fee that will apply to northern Ontario for 1978 apparently will not apply to half-ton trucks. This fee, of course, applies to passenger cars and motorcycles. My concern in raising the issue this afternoon was that a number of families in northern Ontario possess as their sole family vehicle half-ton trucks, and they would not qualify under the present announcement of a $10 licence plate fee.

I have checked with the Ministry of Transportation and Communications and the minister in his answer this afternoon alluded to the fact that if half-ton trucks were registered as passenger vehicles they could qualify for a $10 licence plate fee. If that is a change in the ministry’s policy, I welcome that announcement

But upon checking with the Ministry of Transportation and Communications, I was told that a person going into the licence office saying he would like to register his half-ton truck as a passenger vehicle would be told definitely that he could not do that. He could not register a half-ton truck as a passenger vehicle and therefore could not qualify for the $10 licence plate.

If the minister wishes to make an announcement changing that, that would be great. But as I understand it, the ministry at present does not licence a vehicle as to what it is used for, but as to what it is. The present regulation on a half-ton truck is a classification based on its manufacture and by definition a half-ton truck is a commercial vehicle.

At present, to have a half-ton truck registered as a passenger vehicle it would have to undergo major structural changes. These changes would have to be documented and this documentation sent to the ministry here in Toronto before the half-ton truck would be reclassified as a passenger vehicle.

As I say, if the minister is willing to make the change, I welcome that change. If he would like to share with the House that change in regulation tonight that would allow half-ton trucks to be classed as passenger vehicles, I look forward to that statement. Unfortunately the present regulations for half-ton trucks require a $33 minimum licence.

I also mentioned this afternoon that I felt half-ton trucks that were used for farm purposes should also be allowed the $10 licence plate fee. The reason I mentioned this is that at present most half-ton trucks would qualify for the minimum $33 licence plate fee. But with the new commercial vehicle rates announced by the Treasurer in this House, that would become a flat rate increase on all commercial vehicles of $22 plus nine per cent. Therefore, the $33 minimum with that new rate would become $60. So therefore, a farmer or a family that has as the sole family vehicle a half-ton truck would now pay $60 in the year 1978.

But the $10 licence plate fee for northern Ontario would mean that somebody who has a Cadillac, who would pay under the new regulations $80 in southern Ontario for his licence plate, would only pay $10. I’m sure the minister will agree with me that there’s a tremendous injustice there. A family that can only have as their sole family vehicle a half-ton truck would have to pay $60 under the new regulations, where somebody whipping around the countryside in a Cadillac would pay $10. I would hope this would be corrected.

Mr. Acting Speaker: I would like to inform the member, you have about 15 seconds.

Mr. Bain: Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. I would hope the minister will allow for families who have only a half-ton truck ent reduction that he mentioned for farmers would also be allowed this new $10 rate for their trucks. Possibly the minister might even give consideration to somebody who used his half-ton truck solely for recreational purposes. I would just like to add that the present reduction that we mentioned for farmers does not include the 5,000-pound or half-ton vehicle. Therefore, a farmer pays the same basic $33 now and is not given a discount so he can’t use that to allow for a discount.

I look forward to the minister’s comment that he will apply equity to all people in northern Ontario and allow this $10 rate for half-ton trucks.

[11:15]

Hon. Mr. Snow: Mr. Speaker, as the hon. member has stated, when this question was asked it was about 30 seconds before Mr. Speaker declared the question period over and I don’t think we had a chance to clarify the matter properly at that time. As I was saying when the question period ended, it was my understanding that a half-ton pickup truck or a van can be registered as a passenger vehicle. Perhaps my interpretation or my phraseology wasn't exactly correct; perhaps I should have said a recreational vehicle.

To expand on that, passenger plates are issued to half-ton pickups or to vans provided these vehicles have been converted to some degree to be used as recreational vehicles. This has been the policy of the ministry for some time. I would also say that the fee schedule at the present time contains special reduced fees for farm vehicles, starting at 6,000 pounds, which is the normal licence weight at which a person would license a truck if he was using it for farm purposes.

Mr. Bain: Not a half-ton truck though.

Hon. Mr. Snow: Well, a half-ton truck weighs about 4,000 to 4,500 pounds. If one is going to carry any load one would expect him to licence that for 6,000 pounds. The safe load that can be considered to be carried on a normal half-ton truck is about one ton. He has to license it for one ton above what the net weight of the truck is, so it is around 6,000 pounds. People who use them only for passenger purposes generally license them for 5,000 pounds, but a farmer who is going to go to the mill to pick up a ton of feed is going to need a 6,000-pound licence and he does qualify at 6,000 pounds for a reduced fee.

Mr. Bain: How much?

Hon. Mr. Snow: The fee on a 6,000-pound licence is $41 at the present rate compared to $49 for a non-farm vehicle. The difference gets much larger on the larger trucks.

Mr. Bain: Not $10.

Hon. Mr. Snow: The new policy set forth in the recent budget by the Treasurer will affect many of the regulations made under The Highway Traffic Act. There are many charts and pages and pages of calculations. That is the regulation book that we use in the office that lists the fees for all the different types of vehicles that we license; the farm fees, the regular fees, the recreational fees and so on. These regulations must be reviewed in detail.

As I say, the budget speech just referred to the basic policy of the reduced rate. My ministry staff, in the next days and weeks, and I guess in the months ahead, will have to recalculate and prepare a completely new regulation to bring about the changes to implement the new policies as announced in the budget. These, of course, then must go to regulation committee and cabinet to be dealt with so that the regulation can be passed some time prior to December 1 -- obviously a period ahead of December 1 to allow the regulation to be printed and to go out to our agents so they will have them for issuing the new licences starting December 1.

The Treasurer’s budget referred to about three lines. Obviously there are a great many pages required to verify all of these. We will be working out all of these different calculations during the summer and the new regulation will be ready in the fall. Traditionally, over the years the cost of the licence for a pickup truck has been roughly the same as that for a car, because I accept the fact that many families use a pickup truck in some cases as their only vehicle and in many cases as their second car.

Mr. Acting Speaker: There are about 15 seconds left.

Hon. Mr. Snow: Okay, I don’t need it.

Mr. Bain: Will it now be $10?

Hon. Mr. Snow: These things will all be taken into consideration and will all be clarified when the regulation is published this summer.

Mr. Bain: Will it be $10?

CAPITAL WORKS PROJECTS

Mr. Deans: Mr. Speaker, I didn’t realize I was going to have the pleasure of speaking with the Treasurer tonight since he sent me a note that he couldn’t be present. I assume he was trying to keep me out of the House in order that he could claim that I wasn’t interested in the topic.

Interjection.

Mr. Deans: In any event, I want to suggest that the question that was asked today by my colleague from Welland-Thorold (Mr. Swart) is the basis for the supplementary question I asked of the Treasurer. It deals directly with requests of municipalities for a great share of the moneys that they believe and we believe were committed to them under the Edmonton commitment. It appears in the budget that $108 million less than could have been paid was, in fact, paid to the municipalities.

The Treasurer says in his answer today on page 1435-3 of Instant Hansard:

“As it has turned out, slightly less than was anticipated was paid out during 1976 and there is a small variation in the amounts as they have finally been calculated and estimated at this point by the various ministries for 1977. I would not at this point, and I think I have made this quite clear, go back and suggest changes to a whole host of regulations and legislation and in effect say to the municipalities I am going to catch up on the errors ...”

First of all, $108 million at this point in time is not a small amount. Secondly, we are faced in the province of Ontario with in excess of seven per cent unemployment generally, with over 25 per cent unemployment in construction and there were a number of concrete suggestions made to the ministry by the school board of Metropolitan Toronto and by other municipalities about projects which were both necessary and desirable and which could have gone ahead in this current year and could have eased the burden of unemployment for the people in the construction trades.

But that is not exactly the problem that I see. With regard to the specific proposals for work programmes, my colleague asked the ministry whether it is worthy of consideration of approval that these things be placed before the government and in fact whether they are a far better method of creating employment than the fast write-offs that the government has given to corporations.

The Treasurer said: “The philosophy of this government is quite clear. It’s the private sector which is going to ultimately put people back to work in a meaningful way.” He went on to say: “If you want to go on, recognizing that school board expenditures are going to be paid either by Metropolitan Toronto taxpayers or by us, then inevitably you must [have] either borrowing or higher taxes. That’s your philosophy, not ours.”

I want to begin by saying to the Treasurer this: that when you are faced with 25 per cent plus unemployment in construction; when you are faced with in excess of seven per cent unemployment generally; and when you have $108 million that should have been paid to municipalities for capital projects which was not paid; and when there are projects which in themselves are both necessary and desirable and which could have been started, or could even yet be started, in these municipalities during this current year, it makes abundant good sense to use that $108 million to put people to work.

What worries me about the Treasurer is exactly what he claims to be his philosophy -- that he would rather sit back and hope by some fanciful means, with no initiative on the part of the government, that the private sector will somehow or other come up with jobs. But he has also admitted in the same budget that the private sector will not be able to come up with the number of jobs which would reduce the level of unemployment to a level which you and I, Mr. Speaker, and my colleague from Welland-Thorold, would consider to be reasonable in a province as industrious and rich with natural resources as this province is.

We have generally accepted in the province of Ontario, not only on our own but at the suggestion of the previous Treasurers -- and I think even at the suggestion of this Treasurer in days gone by, not so long ago -- that three per cent unemployment was an acceptable level for the province of Ontario.

The province has suddenly changed its mind, or perhaps it’s only the Treasurer --

Mr. Acting Speaker: You have about one minute.

Mr. Deans: Thank you -- and now we are talking about a 5.3 per cent permanent unemployment force. We are talking about 320,000 unemployed now in excess of 100,000 more than would have been generally acceptable. We are talking about money available to put these people back to work. We are talking about having to raise from the taxes paid by all of the others who are out of work the necessary moneys to provide either unemployment insurance on the one hand, or welfare benefits on the other hand.

We completely reject the suggestion that it’s better to continue to collect taxes from those who work and to pay welfare benefits to people who could be working but who are put out of work by the policies of this government. We suggest that if there is the money to pay the welfare then there is the money now, using this $108 million and more, to put into effect the projects that are necessary and to put the very people who will now be having to live on welfare on the rolls of the employed.

Mr. Active Speaker: Your time has expired.

Mr. Deans: We opt f or employment; we ought not to put people on to the welfare rolls.

Hon. Mr. McKeough: Mr. Speaker, coming through the rhetoric which we’ve just heard and perhaps heard earlier in question period, obviously the member feels that some sum of money -- $108 million -- should be advanced to municipalities for make-work projects. That’s not the position of the government. I’ve reviewed the answer I’ve given this afternoon and would not change that position.

Mr. Deans: I’m still not satisfied.

Mr. Speaker: I deem the motion to adjourn to have been carried.

The House adjourned at 11:25 p.m.