The House met at 2 p.m.

Prayers.

LEGISLATIVE PAGES

Mr. Speaker: Tomorrow is the last day of its term for the present group of legislative pages, and it’s customary to have their names read into the record for posterity and for the benefit of all involved. I will now read their names into the record.

Laura Baird, from Welland-Thorold; Douglas Brown, from Durham East; Patrick Carter, from York North; David Caswell, from Cochrane South; Sarah Cheetham, from Armourdale; Raymond Dorey, from Kingston and the Islands; Timothy Fairhead, from Chatham-Kent; Susan Farrow, from Renfrew South; Jude Fernandes, from Mississauga North; Ronald Goodhand, from Lambton; Laurie Hildebrandt, from Renfrew North; Margaret Holbik, from Lake Nipigon; Caitlin Imrie, from Ottawa East; Christine Maathuis, from Ottawa South; Tena Moore, from London North, Tracey Nesbitt, from Victoria-Haliburton; Margaret Payne, from Windsor-Walkerville; Gregory Reynolds, from Wellington-Dufferin-Peel; Peter Saranchuk, from St. Catharines; Paul St. Amour, from Scarborough Centre; Julie Starratt, from Scarborough-Ellesmere; and Rainer Vietze, from Wellington South.

Would you join with me in thanking them for their service to this House.

MISSISSAUGA TRAIN FIRE

Mr. Cassidy: Mr. Speaker, on a point of order: In view of the very substantial public concern about the chlorine still in the air in Mississauga and the dangers there, I would like to ask if there will be a statement from the government, before we begin questions, about what is happening, what is likely to happen, and what dangers there may be to individuals from current or prospective emissions in that area?

Hon. Mr. Timbrell: Mr. Speaker, as one of the ministers involved in supporting my colleague the Solicitor General (Mr. McMurtry), my understanding is that he is on the site and that any report would come from him as the lead minister in all of this. But at this point, he’s out there; I’m not sure whether he’s going to be here for question period today.

ORAL QUESTIONS

TEACHER-BOARD DISPUTES

Mr. S. Smith: I have a question of the Minister of Education, Mr. Speaker. Is she prepared to introduce legislation calling for compulsory arbitration in the case of the Brant county elementary school strike so that innocent children will not have to be the victims of yet another strike as was the case of the elementary students in Peel? Will she act now, or will we have to go through another situation of the kind we have had before?

Hon. Miss Stephenson: Mr. Speaker, the provisions of Bill 100 developed a procedure which the school boards and the teaching federation are required to follow in order to attempt to reach a negotiated settlement.

If there were indications from either side in the situation in Brant county that arbitration would be the appropriate answer at this time, I would be very happy to refer that to the Education Relations Commission for its serious consideration. We have no such indication at this point. Under the terms of Bill 100, I must abide by the legislation and rely upon the Education Relations Commission for its careful monitoring of the situation and for its advice, which I’m sure will be forthcoming on a regular basis.

Mr. S. Smith: By way of supplementary: Why does the minister continue to countenance the situation in strike after strike, and make her various remarks about our position on getting rid of the right to strike and the right to lock out in the school systems of Ontario, when her parliamentary assistant has gone on record, according to the Mississauga Times of Wednesday, November 7, as saying as follows:

“Mississauga South MPP Douglas Kennedy said this week he doesn’t think teachers should have the right to strike. ‘There’s got to be a better system,’ said Kennedy, who is Stephenson’s parliamentary assistant on education. ‘The children are the ones that suffer.’”

Do I take it that the minister reserves for her own parliamentary assistant some of the choice adjectives she applied to me and to this party when we said the same thing? What is she going to do about the reasonable recommendations made by her own parliamentary assistant?

Hon. Miss Stephenson: The Leader of the Opposition knows full well that there is a piece of legislation in existence which I believe was initiated first by the activities of the former leader of the Liberal Party in this province who expressed very real concern about the situation within the educational system before 1975. There was all-party support of that piece of legislation and, after four years of the existence of that piece of legislation, I have made the decision that it requires review. That review process has been set in motion.

I will not prejudge the wisdom, the knowledge and the experience of those objective observers and examiners who will be looking at the legislation with the assistance of all people who are involved in educational negotiations, including the parents and the students.

I do not believe that we should presume in any way to make judgements before that review is completed.

Mr. Nixon: Supplementary, Mr. Speaker: Does the minister’s intransigent position mean that the strike will have to go on for the customary three weeks before the Education Relations Commission will even give consideration to a recommendation that the students’ welfare is being negatively affected by the closing of the schools?

Hon. Miss Stephenson: Mr. Speaker, I do not believe there is any rigidity related to the administration of that bill. If the members of the Education Relations Commission, on the basis of their careful monitoring, suggest there needs to be action taken at some point, at any point within the term of the current dispute, I will most seriously consider it and ask my colleagues to consider it as well.

The position could not be described as intransigent. We are simply attempting to make a piece of legislation work which the honourable member himself supported strongly when it was introduced four years ago.

I recognize that there are some difficulties with that legislation, which was the reason for initiating the review, and that review must be completed first.

Mr. S. Smith: May I ask a supplementary? Since the parliamentary assistant to the minister must represent her on occasion when she cannot be present, can the minister explain to us what kind of answer her parliamentary assistant will give when asked about his opinion on teachers’ right to strike? Will the parliamentary assistant say what he honestly believes or will he say what the minister tells him to say? Which of the two, the minister or her assistant, speaks for government policy?

Hon. Miss Stephenson: I have never directed the honourable member, who is my parliamentary assistant, to say anything about anything. He is entitled to his opinion. This happens to be a free, democratic country. I would anticipate that the Leader of the Opposition would not impose that kind of duress upon the members of his caucus. I would hope that he would not at any rate. The parliamentary assistant, as does any member of this government, has the right to speak his own opinion upon occasion.

Mr. S. Smith: I would still like to know what he is going to say when he is there representing the minister.

Mr. Speaker: Order and new question.

ENERGY EXPORTS

Mr. S. Smith: Mr. Speaker, a question for the Minister of Energy: Is the Minister of Energy going to take any further action with regard to his federal colleagues, his cousins in Ottawa, who seem determined to permit the export of large quantities of so-called surplus natural gas from this country? Does the minister not agree with me that the concept of surplus is a very questionable one when we will be exporting the cheap natural gas, which is easy to find and cheap to produce, and years from now we will be stuck, as has happened with oil, with the more expensive stuff for Canadians? Doesn’t he think Ontario should take a strong stand against such further exports?

Hon. Mr. Welch: Mr. Speaker, if the Leader of the Opposition had carefully read the position of this government as set out in the two papers, the August paper and the October paper, about which he has had a great deal to say, he would know that this government took a very strong position that there should be perhaps a reasonable allowance with respect to exports, but only after the National Energy Board and those responsible for making these determinations were satisfied that domestic needs would be met. That is quite clearly the position with the province of Ontario.

Mr. S. Smith: By way of supplementary: The minister is correct that the province has stated there should only be further exports if the NEB determined there was a surplus. But I am asking the minister, in view of the events of the last couple of days, for instance, whether he feels that this concept of surplus -- when speaking of natural gas or oil -- is a meaningful one, or is it simply quite wrong and against the interests of our country, and particularly against the interests of Ontario, to export the cheap natural gas simply because there are some indications that there are further reserves, probably more expensive to produce later on, which are still in the ground somewhere in Alberta or in the country?

Does the minister not feel that it is insufficient to just let the NEB have their formula, 25A-4 or 30A-1, or whatever? Does the minister not consider that Ontario should make the point strongly now that we don’t regard any natural gas, at this time, as surplus to the needs of this country, and that we want to massively substitute it for oil so that our children will have cheap energy and not be stuck in the position we are all going to be facing in oil very shortly?

Hon. Mr. Welch: I do not fuel we should make such a sweeping generalization with respect to the definition of what may or may not be surplus. However, I would agree with the Leader of the Opposition that the government of this province has taken a very careful, well understood position with respect to what are the factors that lead to the determination of supply; that there would be some consideration given to what would be more expensive natural gas that would come on after the present supplies have been exhausted, which should be taken into account with respect to rates; and that there would be no extensive or blanket export agreements until the domestic need situation in this country has been taken into account.

It becomes a matter of definition, and a very essential one, as to what influences the National Energy Board in making that determination.

[2:15]

Ms. Gigantes: Supplementary, Mr. Speaker: I would like to ask the minister, since he speaks of the importance of the definition, just what his definition is on behalf of the Ontario public. Isn’t he concerned that this phrase “access to future Canadian needs” is the same phrase the Honourable Joe Greene used to feed us while we were exporting our oil?

Hon. Mr. Welch: Mr. Speaker, perhaps I can answer the question by saying that, as far as I am concerned, I am sure the National Energy Board has the expertise and is equipped with whatever it may need with respect to research to some to some determination as to what the supply situation is.

I would hope the honourable member would agree with the position taken by the government of Ontario on this subject of export, that we should ensure our own needs before there is any further increase with respect to exports.

Mr. J. Reed: Supplementary, Mr. Speaker: Would the minister not agree as a matter of principle the word “surplus” is inappropriate when it comes to assessing any nonrenewable resource?

Hon. Mr. Welch: That is an interesting point of view, Mr. Speaker. I suppose what we are really talking about is in comparative terms. The honourable member himself, in his contribution to the energy debate here a week or so ago, talked in terms of the need for us to convert to an energy supply source which seemed to be in more abundance than the conventional one: i.e., fuel oil. So the vocabulary in this debate becomes very important.

It would seem we can rely on the supply of natural gas, which is far more predictable and in greater abundance than oil, and indeed we can do something with respect to the conservation of our demand for oil by encouraging our people to convert to gas. That is all the more reason why in the spirit of this exchange with respect to this question, it is very important that we satisfy ourselves with respect to the availability of that energy form before we agree to substantial increases with respect to its export.

Mr. Renwick: Mr. Speaker, a supplementary question related to this question of exports: Is the province engaged in any discussions or negotiations with the provinces to the east with respect to the provision of facilities for the transportation of natural gas to the eastern part of the country?

Hon. Mr. Welch: Mr. Speaker, I know of no formal negotiations with the provinces to the east, but in the discussions going on now, and certainly as recently as the first ministers’ conference, there has been a great deal talked about with respect to the extension of natural gas to Quebec City and the question, of course, as to whether there would be a pipeline farther east. These matters are before the National Energy Board. There are questions that have to be answered in that connection as well with respect to the distribution systems that are in place.

To be specific with respect to the question asked, since I have assumed this responsibility I have not been personally engaged in any formal discussions. As the member knows, the government of Ontario has made representation before the National Energy Board with respect to the extension of that pipeline related to the overall energy situation both here and throughout the country.

HEALTH SERVICE CHARGES

Mr. Cassidy: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Minister of Health arising out of the breakdown of the gentlemen’s agreement between the ministry and the Ontario Medical Association, under which people were not meant to have to pay an Ontario Medical Association fee if their doctor had failed to inform them in advance that he was extra-billing.

Since the OMA is now telling individuals across the province that as members of a voluntary association they may or may not follow its recommendations and that it has no authority to make recommendations or strict rules that the members must follow, can the minister say what steps the government intends to take, since this is in clear contradiction to his statements in the spring and as recently as October, that no person would have to pay extra if they were not informed In advance?

Hon. Mr. Timbrell: Mr. Speaker, with respect, I think the honourable member is misinterpreting what I understand is being told. What is being said is what we all understand, that the agreement is not a regulation or a statute. That is quite true and that has been understood by everyone from the beginning.

What it does represent is an agreement on the principles of the operation of our health-care plan.

I would repeat again that what we’ve found is in those cases where the individuals avail themselves of the service, either at the direction of the local MPP or directly to the medical association, that by and large the few difficulties that arise can be resolved. That isn’t to say there aren’t some that remain and there aren’t some difficulties.

I may say too that in that statement the medical association and the ministry allowed that if the medical association couldn’t make it work as they offered, eventually the government might have to consider some form of consumer protection legislation.

I don’t agree with the member’s assessment that the system has broken down. The very small number of instances that have come to light, as compared to the millions of times since last March that individuals have received medical services, does not indicate the system has broken down.

Mr. Cassidy: Supplementary: Since the minister said in a letter to the member for Windsor-Riverside (Mr. Cooke), dated October 10, that the patient is not obliged to pay an additional fee if he or she has not been informed in advance; and since Mr. Kelly, about whose case this letter was written, and other individuals are being told to pay in advance and are having collection agencies sent after them if they are refusing to pay the extra fee, although they weren’t told in advance; why will the minister not act now and implement the rider to his statement last spring; that is, if the agreement didn’t work, the government would bring in the necessary legislation or regulations to protect the public, the health consumers of Ontario?

Hon. Mr. Timbrell: I don’t believe I have my copy of my letter to the member for Windsor-Riverside with me, but I believe I was quoting from the March 29 statement, which said a person should not --

Mr. Cassidy: It’s broken down; it’s not working. You’re in conflict with them.

Hon. Mr. Timbrell: With respect, since that statement was made in this House almost eight months ago, we have paid out claims to the extent that almost 40 million times since that statement was made in March, people have received medical services.

Undoubtedly, the honourable member and other members have raised individual cases that would indicate some difficulties in the relationship between individual patients and individual doctors. It indicates more work needs to be done, particularly in the area of anaesthesia. I acknowledge that and have acknowledged that.

When we compare 40 million services since March with the number of claims the honourable member has raised, including the one that was written about in the Windsor Star on Monday, it certainly does not indicate that the system had broken down; quite the contrary.

Mr. Cooke: Supplementary, Mr. Speaker: I would like to ask the minister what he suggests Mr. Kelly do. Mr. Kelly was charged $123 over and above the OHIP fee schedule. He received a letter from OMA, dated November 6, which states they cannot and will not deal with this case because his doctor is not a member of OMA. If figures are going to be published on the number of doctors who are out of OHIP and who is out of OHIP, the minister is also going to have to give us a list of who is out of OMA. Or is he finally going to recognize that the agreement doesn’t work and take the appropriate action?

Hon. Mr. Timbrell: Mr. Speaker, I’ll look again at that individual case out of 40 million that have received service since March and see if there is something that can be done. I take it, in that particular case, the individual got good medical care as well. This is something that is always forgotten.

Mr. Cassidy: I’m not sure whether the minister realizes that many people don’t like to have their cases aired in public, as we have been obliged to do here in this Legislature.

Is the minister aware that the most recent interim report from the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario states specifically that there has been a marked increase in the number of complaints concerning fees? Is the minister aware that the college states most complainants accepted the explanation that a doctor is not required to notify a patient his fee will be in excess of the OHIP schedule of benefits?

Is the minister aware that the College of Physicians and Surgeons, rather than telling the doctors not to charge OHIP, is explaining to complainants they have to pay over OHIP because there is no other means to require the doctor to charge the OHIP fee? The complaints are going to the College of Physicians and Surgeons; they are not always coming into this party. Why will the minister not act now, by regulation or by legislation, to protect the health consumers of Ontario?

Hon. Mr. Timbrell: I am well aware of the practice of the member’s party about raising the names of individuals. I am also aware of the report in Monday’s Windsor Star about a Mr. Ursuliak who commented on the methodology of the member’s party, on its principles, and on how it uses people for its own political purposes. That article is well known to the members of the House and to the gallery, and it has exposed his party’s tactics for what they are.

Secondly, the member talks about changing that particular regulation. I ask him once again to consider what he is suggesting that people be subjected to. He is suggesting that it be added to the section on --

Mr. Cassidy: Is the minister saying that doctors will disobey a regulation of this province?

Mr. Speaker: Order.

Hon. Mr. Timbrell: Mr. Speaker, I sat here quietly listening to the member’s question. For once, would he like to listen to an answer? It is clear he hasn’t listened to one for months; he hasn’t listened once.

What the member is suggesting is to put in place a procedure where people in those few instances where there is this kind of conflict would be taken through a very lengthy, involved procedure of complaint committees, discipline committees, potentially health discipline forums, potentially the Ombudsman and potentially the courts, as opposed to a system that has shown itself to be one that will work.

Mr. Cooke: On a point of privilege, Mr. Speaker?

Mr. Speaker: What’s your point of privilege?

Mr. Cooke: My point of privilege is that the minister is quoting from a newspaper article that appeared in my local paper, indicating that I used a specific case in this Legislature for political reasons. I want to point out to the Legislature that permission was granted by that individual to raise his case in the Legislature. That was pointed out in the article, and the minister does not recognize that.

The fact of the matter is that that individual came into my office with two complaints. One was that he had not received his Canada pension from the federal government; we resolved that problem. The second problem was that this guy was being double billed by Dr. Stecko, and that problem has been resolved because of intervention by me and this party.

Hon. Mr. Timbrell: Mr. Speaker, may I speak to the point of privilege?

Mr. Speaker: Well, it’s trying to correct the record in the eyes of the member for Windsor-Riverside.

OHIP-OMA FEE SCHEDULES

Mr. Cassidy: Mr. Speaker, I have another question for the Minister of Health. In view of the fact that the Ontario Medical Association has decided to increase the OMA fee schedule by 11.9 per cent, effective January 1, 1980, and to reject the government’s offer of an 11.24 per cent increase in the OHIP fee schedule for the same date, would the minister say what will be the next steps taken by the government to get a settlement of fees with doctors for 1980, and will the government insist that doctors stop extra-billing as a condition of Ontario’s settlement of next year’s OHIP fee schedule?

Hon. Mr. Timbrell: Mr. Speaker, first of all, the joint committee on physicians’ compensation is meeting today. The negotiations are proceeding on the development of a 1980 schedule for OHIP.

Second, as regards to the last point, I don’t know what the policy of the member’s party is. I read what he said in Hamilton, in May, when he was talking about there being no Draconian measures. I read the bill from the member for Oshawa (Mr. Breaugh) which provides for doctors to continue to bill in excess of OHIP in many cases; then I read another bill from another member of his party that takes yet another position. His party is trying to be all things to all people. The fact of the matter is we have a system in this province that works, and works darn well, and we are going to keep it.

Mr. Cassidy: Since the minister knows perfectly well that the New Democrats have said specifically that there should be one price for medicine in Ontario, whether the doctor bills through the plan or whether he bills at the OHIP fee schedule --

Mr. Speaker: Question.

Mr. Cassidy: -- directly to the public, I won’t answer that particular part of his response.

Mr. Speaker: It is your duty to ask questions, not to answer them.

Mr. Martel: Somebody has to be factual.

Mr. Cassidy: That’s right, Mr. Speaker. The supplementary is this: Since the OMA stated in its latest bulletin that the OMA representatives were instructed to reopen negotiations with a view to narrowing the gap between the schedule of benefits and the OMA schedule of fees, and since that gap now is 42 per cent on average across the province, can the minister explain how the government justifies an offer of 11.24 per cent for doctors, or an offer that may be increased if the OMA’s demands to narrow the gap are met, when hospitals are given an increase of only 4.5 per cent in their budget this year, and when health-care workers who make a third as much as doctors are being given increases averaging only six to eight per cent?

[2:30]

Hon. Mr. Timbrell: I have no intention of confirming any of the numbers mentioned by the member. We believe that when we are negotiating we don’t do it here on the floor of the House; we do it through the agreed-on procedure known as the JCPC -- the joint committee on physician compensation. It’s to be hoped they will be able to bring about a settlement in the not-too-distant future for the 1980 OHIP schedule.

I would also point out to the honourable member -- and I have said this repeatedly -- the OMA schedule is irrelevant to the question of billing. There are many physicians who from the beginnings of the health plan were participants and never charged more than OHIP.

Mr. Cassidy: It’s irrelevant? That isn’t funny.

Hon. Mr. Timbrell: It has always been irrelevant as regards the question he is trying to address.

The honourable member will recall that, in the select committee report, NDP members repeatedly urged on the government that we address the concerns of physicians about compensation, specifically general practitioners and psychiatrists and a few other groups. We are trying, in the course of the negotiations, to do just that, exactly what that party has said before.

Mr. Cassidy: Supplementary: Would the minister explain why, when doctors are being offered increases that are almost double what are going to many health-care workers and when the increase being offered to doctors is almost double the guideline that was set for public servants in Ontario for 1979, the government is not insisting, at the very least, as a condition of the settlement for 1980 that doctors agree to stop extra-billing in 1980 when the new OHIP fee schedule is struck?

Hon. Mr. Timbrell: Again, I don’t intend to do the negotiations on the floor of the House. I think the honourable member will see, once a settlement is arrived at, the figures he is quoting are not correct.

ASSISTANCE TO STUDENTS

Mr. Sweeney: Mr. Speaker, a question to the Minister of Colleges and Universities: Given that the recent Carleton University student study clearly shows that students entering university during the past two years are coming from families with increasingly higher incomes, what has happened to the minister’s pledge made to my leader last October 27 that she would do an in-depth examination of the student awards program as to how it affects certain traditionally disadvantaged populations such as the poor and the minority groups?

I quote from the minister’s statement: “We will be making an in-depth examination of the information which is flowing in now and be comparing it with the final enrolment data which we should have by the end of October or early November.”

Hon. Miss Stephenson: Mr. Speaker, we are examining that information, and that study should be available to us very shortly.

Mr. Sweeney: How can the minister properly assess the effectiveness of the $90-million student awards program without this kind of basic data? Does she have any evidence of the negative effect of freezing the cost-of-living component of this program?

Hon. Miss Stephenson: No, we do not have specific evidence of any negative effects from freezing the cost-of-living component. That matter was put before us by the Ontario Federation of Students last year and again this year. It will be considered for the criteria and terms for the year 1980-81.

The applications for student assistance have not dropped dramatically within the past year. The total number of applications received as of November 10 is, I believe, 800 fewer than it was for the corresponding period in 1978.

We are aware, from preliminary examination, that the bulk of students being aided and assisted by the student assistance program are from families with incomes of less than $15,000 a year. I believe that is an indication that the student assistance program is being directed towards the appropriate groups within our society.

The purpose of the program is to provide support to those students who might not even consider a university training career, if they were to be faced immediately with a burden of debt from day one. I believe the preliminary information I’ve seen supports that philosophy and that we’re moving in the right direction.

We felt very strongly we had to have the information available from last year’s applications and this year’s applications with whatever income information was made available to us in order to make a definitive study of the direction which the program is taking and whether it’s meeting the requirements which were set for it.

Mr. Cooke: Supplementary, Mr. Speaker: From what the minister has said, I’d like to ask whether she is considering a tuition increase before the study on the effectiveness of the new Ontario student awards program is complete? She has said the study wasn’t completed.

Hon. Miss Stephenson: Mr. Speaker, I would remind the honourable member that the P. S. Ross study has been out there for some time. It has been responded to by a very large number of groups and individuals. All of those responses have been collated, and certain recommendations which have been developed as a result of those responses are being considered at this time.

Much of the information related to the effectiveness of the student assistance program, I’m sure, will be available to us before that final decision is made.

Mr. Sweeney: On the basis of the minister’s answer, I would like to ask whether she is aware that approvals for the Ontario student awards program have dropped in the last two years from 76,651 to 63,653? That’s a drop of 13,000.

Hon. Miss Stephenson: I would remind the honourable member that the criteria, the requirements for the program, were changed in the year 1978. There was a different basis for applying for student assistance.

The member is comparing 1971 figures with 1979 figures. He should be comparing the applications for the year 1978 to the applications for the year 1979-80.

Mr. Sweeney: It changed in 1977.

Hon. Miss Stephenson: The change was not in effect for the student year 1977-78. It was in effect for 1978-79. The change has been in existence now, or will be by the end of this school year, for two years. The member really cannot compare the figures for 1977-78 with those figures he quoted for 1979-80. It’s like comparing apples and oranges, because the basis is different.

Mr. Sweeney: It still knocked 13,000 out of the system.

Hon. Miss Stephenson: No, that’s not true.

Mr. Speaker: Order.

TELEPHONE CHARGES

Mr. Swart: Mr. Speaker, in view of the absence of the Minister of Transportation and Communications (Mr. Snow) and of the absence of the Minister of Consumer and Commercial Relations (Mr. Drea), I will pose this question to the Deputy Premier.

Could he tell us when the government was informed that Bell Canada has requested the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission to give approval in proceeding with special charges for all local calls on a trial basis in certain communities?

If this was not discussed with the government prior to the announcement that was made yesterday, does he not think Bell is treating his government in rather a high-handed manner? If he did know, why did he not make it public, and what view did he express to Bell and to the CRTC?

Hon. Mr. Welch: Mr. Speaker, now that the honourable member has that question on record, I will be very glad to draw it to the attention of my cabinet colleague the Minister of Transportation and Communications, from whom he can expect to have a full answer.

Mr. Swart: When he draws that to the attention of the Minister of Transportation and Communications, will the Deputy Premier also inform him that those who are going to be hurt most by charging for the number and length of local calls are those who can least afford to be hurt -- the senior citizens, the handicapped and the housewives? Will he also tell the minister that there is tremendous potential for ripoff and that consumers have no practical way of checking their bills?

Does the minister himself not think his government should intervene to protect the consumers in this matter? Will his government do an in-depth examination of this issue and take a strong stand with Bell Canada and the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission in support of the telephone users?

Hon. Mr. Welch: One of the reasons this party has been given the opportunity to form the government of this province for so many years has been its legitimate concern for the very people to whom the member wants to draw our attention. We are always concerned with respect to the consumers, the people on fixed incomes, all sorts and conditions of men.

AID TO TOBACCO GROWERS

Mr. G. I. Miller: I have a question for the Minister of Industry and Tourism, Mr. Speaker.

I wonder if the minister is aware that as many as five or six companies are in financial difficulties in the tobacco-growing area of my riding and other ridings that surround Delhi, brought about by the blue mould disease in the tobacco this year.

Interjections.

Mr. Speaker: Will the honourable member’s colleagues please allow him to complete his question?

Mr. G. I. Miller: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. That is correct: it is blue mould. It has been one of the disasters that has affected our province.

Would it be possible to set up a loan program such as has been done by the federal Department of Agriculture for the tobacco farmers in the area so they can borrow up to $40,000, after they have been turned down by two banks or other financial institutions, at an interest rate of one half of one per cent above the prime rate? Would the minister give consideration to that?

Hon. Mr. Grossman: Mr. Speaker, I would be pleased to investigate what we can do about that particular source of blue mould in that part of the province. Other types of blue mould we wouldn’t want to inhibit, but that particular type we would. I will look into that for the member.

CARBON EMISSIONS

Ms. Gigantes: I have a question for the Minister of Energy, Mr. Speaker.

Can the minister confirm that Hydro staff presented a special briefing on carbon 14 to the last meeting of the Hydro board, and that Hydro staff will be meeting either tomorrow or Monday with the Atomic Energy Control Board to discuss safety concerns associated with carbon 14? Can he also enlighten us on the reason for all this activity and concern about carbon 14?

Hon. Mr. Welch: Mr. Speaker, it is my understanding that Ontario Hydro has informed the nuclear regulatory agency, the Atomic Energy Control Board, that work is proceeding on analysis of C-14 in airborne effluents from nuclear stations.

It is also my understanding, and I was just advised of this prior to coming into the House, that the select committee on Ontario Hydro affairs has placed this question of C-14 on its agenda for early in the new year.

Ms. Gigantes: As the select committee on Hydro affairs won’t be able to consider any of this material until the new year, would the minister please table with the House what information is being produced within Hydro concerning carbon 14? Would he also give us some explanation of why carbon 14, although it has not been regularly monitored as an emission from nuclear plants, is now a subject of such great concern?

Hon. Mr. Welch: I can’t give an undertaking with respect to tabling until I have had an opportunity to check with the parties involved. Certainly, I will be glad to report back to the House after I have followed up on the honourable member’s question with the officials of Hydro.

VANDALISM

Mr. Hennessy: Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask the Minister of Housing a question. Recently, in the city of Thunder Bay, on Red River Road, a senior citizens’ home was vandalized, causing damages of $250,000. I would like to ask the minister who is responsible for the damage financially; if there is any information as to who did the damage; and when the home will open.

[2:45]

Hon. Mr. Bennett: Mr. Speaker, I’m not sure of the amount of damage that was sustained by the structure. I must inform the House that the building at the moment is still under the ownership and direction of the contractor, so any claims which might arise definitely would be against his insurance company and be between him and his insurance company.

I do understand -- and I will have to get further information on it -- that there will be some delay of a month to two months in the final completion and occupancy of this particular development in Thunder Bay.

Mr. Hennessy: I would like to ask the minister if the information I have received is not factual. I understand it’s going to be at least six months before they get going, not a month. I would like the minister to look into it.

Hon. Mr. Bennett: As I said, I will look into the dates for completion and inform the House further.

HIGHWAY CONSTRUCTION

Mr. T. P. Reid: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Minister of Northern Affairs. I’m making it partly because he hasn’t responded to my letter of some weeks ago.

Will the minister look into the condition, particularly in the area of construction, of highway 11, 10 miles east of Atikokan; and will he respond to my letter in regard to the abysmal shape and the unsafe conditions of the highway 40 miles east of Atikokan, which is not under construction, with a view to speeding up the rebuilding of that stretch of the highway?

Hon. Mr. Bernier: Mr. Speaker, I have just read a letter from the reeve of Atikokan, Mr. Jack Pierce, on this very issue. I will be glad to take it under consideration and have a careful review made of the whole situation relating to highway 11.

Mr. T. P. Reid: Will the minister do his best to speed up the rebuilding of that stretch of highway to improve it and bring it up to a safe condition? Will he also have another look at the policy of the Ministry of Transportation and Communications to rebuild only a 10-mile stretch of highway, in order to have that highway fixed as quickly as it can possibly be done?

Hon. Mr. Bernier: As the honourable member is very much aware, we’re looking at the question of accelerating construction of the Bending Lake Road. I think there is some necessity to approve and get that access opened up as quickly as possible. I will certainly take the member’s suggestions into consideration, as we look into the 1980 program.

UTILITY SERVICES

Mr. B. Newman: Mr. Speaker, I have a question of the Minister of Energy. Will the minister consider the same proposition as is in effect in the state of Michigan, which is that Michigan Consolidated Gas will not discontinue any gas service this winter to any elderly person unable to pay his bill? Will the Minister of Energy approach energy providers in Ontario to encourage them to adopt a similar policy?

Hon. Mr. Welch: Mr. Speaker, I’m having some meetings with representatives of the industry fairly soon and I will be very pleased to draw the honourable member’s point to their attention.

Mr. B. Newman: Supplementary, Mr. Speaker: As energy suppliers in the city of Toronto are now preparing to give a $20 break on home heating, would the Minister of Energy also approach the industry to provide other communities with exactly that same type of an advantage? The citizens of Windsor would likewise appreciate the $20 break in relation to home heating.

Hon. Mr. Welch: Mr. Speaker, I’ll include that in my discussions with the company.

Mr. Makarchuk: Since the past Treasurer of the province of Ontario has now become the president of Union Gas, which is one of the major suppliers of energy in the province, and he has stated in a letter to me that an agreement has been reached between Union Gas and the government of Ontario regarding the curtailment of services, would the minister table that understanding so we know what it’s all about?

Ms. Gigantes: Here comes Darcy again.

Hon. Mr. Welch: Mr. Speaker, I would be very glad to discuss that particular matter with the other party to see whether there’s any reason why it can’t be tabled.

MINING MACHINERY

Mr. Laughren: Mr. Speaker, my question is of the Minister of Industry and Tourism, now that he has returned.

Since the mining machinery show in Sudbury last week was considered a success by the minister, I wonder if he could tell us how successful it was, what contacts he’s made, and what plans he has to follow up the contacts made by both his ministry and by suppliers and consumers of mining machinery in Ontario. Will he, at this time, give us a commitment to co-ordinate or sponsor a mining machinery trade show in Ontario that would represent not just the $40 million worth of machinery represented at the trade show in Sudbury, but the entire $400 million worth of mining machinery that represents the domestic market in Ontario? That represents more than 11,000 jobs in Ontario that we don’t have at the present time.

Hon. Mr. Grossman: I take it the honourable member sees the value of those types of shows and I appreciate his support for that.

The evidence we have to date is from several discussions I had in Sudbury on the floor of the show with both suppliers and prospective purchasers of the six major mining companies. I can remember three separate conversations that day where it was indicated to me there were specific deals concluded and arrangements made. The extent of those, I remember offhand, were over $500,000 worth of business.

My field staff will be following up with each participant in the show to get specifics of the contacts made and see where we might assist them in following up on some of those contacts.

Finally, we will try and widen the number of prospective purchasers and suppliers the next time around. This time, we put major emphasis on trying to get as many people as we could. I think the success of that show will encourage wider participation next time.

Mr. Laughren: A supplementary, if I might: Since we still have more than a $250 million deficit in mining machinery; since this situation has deteriorated very drastically over the last 10 years; and since there are more than 11,000 jobs at stake here represented by those imports, will the minister make it clear to potential manufacturers in Ontario that unless those imports are replaced with domestic manufacturing he is prepared to move, in either joint ventures or through the crown corporation route, to establish a mining machinery industry in Ontario?

Hon. Mr. Grossman: I’m not going to give any blind commitment to move this government into any kind of industrial endeavour until we’re convinced it makes sense to do that -- until we’re convinced we can be competitive, not only in Canada but internationally, and until we’re convinced it will bring enough benefits, in terms of secure jobs, for the layout of funds involved.

All the indications coming out of that show indicate we can make substantial gains in the private sector before we’d even have to turn our minds to that sort of alternative.

FRENCH HEALTH SERVICES

Hon. Mr. Timbrell: Mr. Speaker, on November 6 the member for Scarborough West (Mr. R. F. Johnston) asked the Premier (Mr. Davis), in my absence, what my ministry is doing to encourage French practitioners to serve the French population in northern Ontario. He further asked if my ministry would be willing to consider funding French advisory committees in northern health districts to act as recruitment agencies to deal with potential French practitioners.

I would remind the honourable member it is my ministry’s policy, as outlined by me in Sudbury on September 20, to ensure a full range of health services is provided on a bilingual basis in areas where there are concentrations of francophones. Cochrane is one such area.

Wherever possible the ministry will assign bilingual staff to positions requiring extensive communication with the public. In those areas with concentrations of French-speaking people all ministry public inquiry and counselling services will respond in French to French-language inquiries, whether by telephone or in person. These policies apply not only to the ministry, but health-care agencies and public hospitals receiving operating funds from the ministry will be requested to observe the same policies.

As an incentive, we will provide additional funding to assist hospitals to upgrade their French-language services. We will subsidize language upgrading of certain hospital staff who deal with francophone patients and will also fund the development of bilingual hospital forms. Work on these programs is under way in the ministry under the direction of Mr. Ron LeBlanc, my ministry’s French-language services co-ordinator.

I don’t think it’s appropriate to repeat the full statement I made on francophone services today. If the member is interested, I will be glad to send him a copy of it in whichever language he prefers.

On the question of provision of francophone practitioners, I would remind the member of my ministry’s underserviced area program whereby we provide incentives for physicians to locate in areas designated as needing services. We have already 258 physicians on the program working in 147 communities in Ontario.

The Ministry of Health’s co-ordinator of French-language services recently took part in an underserviced area recruitment program which was organized in the five cities where we have medical schools in the province. This is indicative of our intention to use the underserviced program to attract francophone practitioners.

Finally, Cochrane District Health Council in conjunction with my ministry is developing a French-language service policy for that part of the province. As part of that work, the health council and my ministry are working with the local hospital to develop methods of assuring the delivery of health services in French, including the organization of courses for employees of the hospitals to improve or to learn French.

Mr. Cassidy: If that is the ministry’s policy, could the minister explain why I have been recently informed by the Brockville Psychiatric Hospital that when they receive letters in French they send them down to Toronto to be translated into English, have them returned to Brockville, write the replies in English, send them down to Toronto to be translated into French and then send them back to the people who wrote in the first place? Surely that is not an effective implementation and a rapid response in the other language of this country if these replies have to be translated in that way.

Hon. Mr. Timbrell: I think the honourable member makes a very good point and I will certainly look into that. Brockville itself is not one of the designated areas, but it does draw from the whole of the east where there are a good number of designated areas.

Mr. Cassidy: It is designated. You can’t treat eastern Ontario like that.

Hon. Mr. Timbrell: The member can’t even graciously accept it when I agree with him. He is bad enough when I disagree with him, but he can’t even accept it when I said he is right.

PRESERVATION OF AGRICULTURAL LAND

Mr. Riddell: I wanted to direct this question to the Premier because I think he is aware of it, but in his absence I will direct it to the Minister of Housing since he has jurisdiction over the Planning Act.

Is the Minister of Housing aware of and does he support the numerous statements that have been made by the Minister of Agriculture and Food (Mr. Henderson) encouraging severances in the best agricultural areas of this province for retiring farmers, farm labourers and family members? Further, is he aware of the concern these statements have caused in rural counties which have attempted to preserve good agricultural land and reduce land uses which are incompatible with agriculture?

Hon. Mr. Bennett: I am somewhat aware of the remarks of my colleague, the Minister of Agriculture and Food (Mr. Henderson) who represents extremely well the attitudes and feelings of a great number of people in the farm communities in Ontario. I had this question asked of me yesterday in my estimates also by a member of the same party. I answered very quickly and decisively that I understand what the Minister of Agriculture and Food has been saying in his leniency towards severances.

I am sure there are members of this House on all sides who have some very pet projects as far as severances are concerned. I see the former Liberal leader smiling because I think he and others have had some situations --

Mr. Nixon: You abuse me.

Hon. Mr. Bennett: I would never abuse the member. I always try to accommodate him. It is great to be able to accommodate him because we have the same problems on this side of the House in trying to make sure the farm community is well served.

Mr. Bradley: He is amused by your answer.

Hon. Mr. Bennett: We have tried to make the assessment as to whether there is an appropriate use of the land and whether it happens to be for a son or daughter or a farm worker within the agricultural community on that particular farm. That follows along the lines of the opening remarks of the Minister of Agriculture and Food at various meetings.

Frankly, the final analysis of the decision, if it is referred to the Minister of Housing, will be mine to try to determine whether a severance should or should not stand. In the initial stage, the land severance and land adjustment committee has the right to express that as a local group representing local concerns in severance requirements.

Mr. Riddell: Supplementary: Does the Minister of Housing not agree that these settlements condoning residential severances contradict the government’s own policy statement on the food land guidelines which states that because a farm severance may subsequently be taken over by others and create problems for adjacent farm operations, farmers should be encouraged to consider retirement in a nearby village or town? Will the Minister of Housing remind the Minister of Agriculture and Food, “divided-up Lorne” as he is known in the rural areas, of his government’s policy to support local decision-making which preserves agricultural land?

Hon. Mr. Bennett: I have taken note of all those who have applauded the member for Huron-Middlesex. I would indicate that the next time I have a request from them I shall deal with it accordingly.

[3:00]

Mr. S. Smith: Who are you threatening?

Hon. Mr. Bennett: I wouldn’t want to threaten the member for Hamilton West because it would be far beyond my reason to deal with him in such a way.

An hon. member: What about the Niagara Escarpment?

Hon. Mr. Bennett: Don’t worry about the Niagara Escarpment. Back a few years ago there was a great hue and cry by all members of the Legislature, and indeed by many others, that we were far too restrictive in allowing farmers to have severances on their property.

Mr. S. Smith: Who wrote the guidelines?

Hon. Mr. Bennett: Just hold on. Obviously, the member will never have a chance to amend them either, so he shouldn’t worry about who wrote them.

The fact is, Mr. Speaker, five or more years ago Don Irvine and others indicated clearly that we would try to allow severances to occur on some of the farms. At one time we had a policy where a severance had to be 100 acres. We brought it down to 25 and that still didn’t satisfy a great number of people in the farm community.

We tried to rationalize it in respect of farmers wishing to remain on the farm property who had a son or daughter wishing to run that farm or assist the father or the mother in running and maintaining the farming operation. Indeed, where there were farmhands involved and accommodation was needed for them on site, we would allow severances there. We have allowed most of the severances to be dealt with singularly by a local organization.

Let me say to the member, some of them do not use the greatest degree of good judgement in relation to planning. I have presently before me a request to allow a severance of 10 lots on one piece of land without even going through a subdivision, and I have now questioned it and held it up.

Mr. Swart: Supplementary: In view of the statement by the Minister of Agriculture and Food, which is in direct contravention to statements by both of his predecessors in that office; in view of the flip-flopping of the Minister of Housing on the Hamilton-Wentworth area; and in view of his refusal to support the preservation of the fruitlands in Niagara which his government said must be saved; in view of what they have done in the Niagara Escarpment, can’t we rightly conclude the government has abandoned any attempt to preserve the farm land in this province?

Hon. Mr. Bennett: Mr. Speaker, the last speaker has abandoned the original question, but that doesn’t seem to make much difference.

Frankly, what we have done in the Hamilton-Wentworth area, which was an area to which we granted certain rights for development because the land had already been turned into that situation over many years, and because of the official plan --

Mr. Swart: You refused it at first and the agricultural ministry didn’t want it included.

Hon. Mr. Bennett: Just let me finish -- because of the official plan that existed in that community.

The member wants to be on all sides of the fence at all times. I have indicated clearly to him the situation on land use down in the fruitland area and it is before the Ontario Municipal Board. I hope they will have a full, frank and firm hearing and we will make a final decision on the land-use policy with the input from the member who has 12 requests or appeals before the Ontario Municipal Board on that very subject. There are 12 from the member himself.

Mr. Foulds: Why didn’t you?

Hon. Mr. Bennett: We are not going through a sham, even though the member would think that is what we should do because of his request before that board.

Frankly, I take into consideration what the Minister of Agriculture and Food often expresses in relation to land-use and severance policy, but the final analysis of the situation rests with the Ministry of Housing and the planning division.

Hon. Mr. Henderson: On a point of privilege: The Minister of Agriculture and Food was quoting from the Foodland Guidelines, page 18. It was filed in this House on June 12. That party over there never asked to debate it, so we accept that they adopted those policies.

MISSISSAUGA TRAIN FIRE

Mr. Bounsall: I have a question of the Minister of Natural Resources, in the absence of the Minister of the Environment (Mr. Parrott).

Is the minister aware that in the Mississauga train derailment, with chlorine gas having mixed with propane gas, particularly at the elevated temperatures of the fire, bearing in mind chlorine is a very fast oxidizing agent and very reactive, a fair quantity and range of chlorinated hydrocarbons were likely to be formed, many of which are just as harmful as chlorine gas is?

Therefore would the minister ensure that in the face of this additional health hazard the presence of a wide range of chlorinated hydrocarbons will now be tested for, and the calculations on the dispersal of chlorine gas in the atmosphere based on the assumption that hydrocarbons be carefully rechecked?

Hon. Mr. Auld: Mr. Speaker, I’ll be glad to pass that question and information along to the Minister of the Environment.

Mr. Speaker: The time for oral questions has expired.

STATEMENT BY THE MINISTRY

MISSISSAUGA TRAIN FIRE

Hon Mr. Wells: Mr. Speaker, I will be very brief. I understand that the leader of the New Democratic Party asked about a statement regarding the Mississauga situation. I just want to indicate that the Minister of the Environment and the Attorney General and Solicitor General (Mr. McMurtry), are currently at the --

Mr. Eakins: All three of them?

Hon. Mr. Wells: No, that’s two people for three jobs. They are currently at the control centre there, and couldn’t be in the House today to make a statement. In all likelihood one of them will be here tomorrow to make a complete statement and answer questions for the members of the House.

VISITOR

Mr. Nixon: Mr. Speaker, I know you would want me to bring to your attention the presence under the Speaker’s gallery of Mr. Arthur Evans, the former member for Simcoe Centre, former vice-chairman of Hydro, the former chairman of the select committee on conservation authorities and present good friend of many members here.

PETITION

EDUCATION FUNDING

Mr. Cooke: On behalf of the Ontario Federation of Students, I would like to present the following petition.

“To the Honourable the Lieutenant Governor and the Legislative Assembly of Ontario, we the undersigned beg leave to petition the Parliament of Ontario as follows:

“We protest the government’s restraint program for post-secondary education, cutting off grants to needy graduate and professional school students, increasing tuition fees without consideration of the effects on access for low-income families, and holding provincial funding increases well below the costs, are resulting in universities and colleges unable to provide quality post-secondary education to the citizens of Ontario.

“We urge the government to take the following steps in order to provide quality accessible post-secondary education to Ontario citizens.

“1. Freeze tuition fees pending a thorough study of their affects on access.

“2. Improve student aid so that it meets the financial needs of low-income students.

“3. Restore grants to graduate and professional school students.

“4. Increase funding of post-secondary education to meet increased costs.

“5. Strike a select committee of the Legislature to consider the problems facing post-secondary education.

“6. Seek a federal system of grants to replace the present Canada student loan program.”

Mr. Speaker, this petition has 12,000 signatures of students from across the province.

REPORTS

STANDING GENERAL GOVERNMENT COMMITTEE

Mr. McCaffrey from the standing general government committee reported the following resolution:

Resolved, that supply in the following amounts and to defray the expenses of the Ministry of Housing be granted to Her Majesty for the fiscal year ending March 31, 1980:

Ministry administration program, $11,210,000; community planning program, $79,100,000; land development program, $6,722,000; community development program, $11,206,000; Ontario Land Corporation program, $21,796,000; Ontario Housing Corporation program, $129,852,000; Ontario Mortgage Corporation program, $8,438,000; home buyers grant program, $10,000.

STANDING PROCEDURAL AFFAIRS COMMITTEE

Mr. Breaugh from the standing procedural affairs committee presented the committee’s report and moved its adoption.

Your committee has considered the procedures relating to private members’ public business, and recommends that standing order 64(e) be deleted.

Mr. Breaugh: Mr. Speaker, this recommendation would remove the system of blocking votes on private members’ hour.

On motion by Mr. Breaugh, the debate was adjourned.

STANDING PROCEDURAL AFFAIRS COMMITTEE

Mr. Breaugh from the standing procedural affairs committee presented the following report and moved its adoption:

Your committee has considered the question of “debates without motion,” referred to it by Mr. Speaker’s ruling of October 16, 1979, and recommends:

That a new standing order be incorporated into the section entitled “Annual Reports and Other Sessional Papers,” to read:

“(a) A motion that the House discuss a sessional paper other than a committee report requires notice. No amendment may be made to such a motion.

“(b) When a motion for discussion of a sessional paper is moved, one member from each of the parties in the House may state the position of his party with respect to the motion for not more than five minutes.

“(c) If the motion passes, an order shall be placed on the Order Paper for discussion of the sessional paper by the House.

“(d) During the discussion, no motion relating to the sessional paper may be moved.”

Mr. Breaugh: It is the committee’s feeling that this recommendation will rectify and make somewhat easier, or at least clarify, the rather awkward situation we encountered a short while back. We think it will provide a mechanism whereby such papers as the discussion papers on energy may be discussed by this House with everyone clearly understanding the rules.

On motion by Mr. Breaugh, the debate was adjourned.

MOTION

TRANSFER OF BALLOT ITEM

Hon. Mr. Wells moved that, notwithstanding the standing orders of the House, Mr. Cassidy be permitted to carry Mr. Lawlor’s ballot item on November 29, 1979.

Motion agreed to.

INTRODUCTION OF BILLS

HIGHWAY TRAFFIC AMENDMENT ACT

Hon. Mr. Brunelle, on behalf of Hon. Mr. Snow, moved first reading of Bill 175, An Act to amend the Highway Traffic Act.

Motion agreed to.

ARCHITECTS AMENDMENT ACT

Hon. Mr. Walker, on behalf of Hon. Mr. McMurtry, moved first reading of Bill 176, An Act to amend the Architects Act.

Motion agreed to.

Hon. Mr. Walker: Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to move first reading of the Architects Amendment Act, 1979, on behalf of Mr. McMurtry. The purpose of the bill is to amend the Architects Act to provide an exception to the prohibition on corporate practice in the case of a work project outside of Ontario.

COMPENSATION FOR VICTIMS OF CRIME AMENDMENT ACT

Hon. Mr. Walker, on behalf of Hon. Mr. McMurtry, moved first reading of Bill 171, An Act to amend the Compensation for Victims of Crime Act, 1971.

Motion agreed to.

Hon. Mr. Walker: Mr. Speaker, the purpose of the bill is to remove the limitation on the number of members of the Criminal Injuries Compensation Board and to permit the Lieutenant Governor in Council to appoint such number of members as are considered necessary. The appointment of part-time members in various parts of the province will make the board more accessible and will reduce the delay in arranging hearings.

[3:15]

INTERPROVINCIAL SUBPOENAS ACT

Hon. Mr. Walker, on behalf of Hon. Mr. McMurtry, moved first reading of Bill 178, An Act to provide for the Enforcement of Interprovincial Subpoenas.

Motion agreed to.

Hon. Mr. Walker: Mr. Speaker, the bill provides a procedure by which a subpoena issued out of a court in another province can compel the attendance at a civil trial of a witness who is in Ontario. The out-of-province subpoena must be received and adopted by an Ontario court, which must determine that the subpoena complies with conditions set out in the act.

Similar legislation is in force in several provinces so that a procedure to compel witnesses who are located in other provinces to come to Ontario to give evidence will also be available.

POWERS OF ATTORNEY ACT

Hon. Mr. Walker, on behalf of Hon. Mr. McMurtry, moved first reading of Bill 179, An Act entitled the Powers of Attorney Act, 1979.

Motion agreed to.

Hon. Mr. Walker: Mr. Speaker, this bill implements recommendations made several years ago by the Ontario Law Reform Commission. The bill makes provision, with appropriate safeguards for granting a power of attorney exercisable after the mental incapacity of the donor. The bill also provides a simplified form of general power of attorney.

UNIFIED FAMILY COURT AMENDMENT ACT

Hon. Mr. Walker, on behalf of Hon. Mr. McMurtry, moved first reading of Bill 180, An Act to amend the Unified Family Court Act, 1976.

Motion agreed to.

Hon. Mr. Walker: Mr. Speaker, the purpose of this bill is to extend the life of the unified family court in Hamilton and to preserve the existing situation in respect of that court until it is possible to make a firm decision on the future of the unified family court.

At present, the legislation provides for the unified family court project to end on July 1, 1980. The amendment would provide for the repeal of the Unified Family Court Act on a day to be named by proclamation.

As the members of this House know, we and the other provinces are currently engaged in discussions with the federal government about the transfer of certain responsibilities from the federal government to the provincial government. Part of this discussion involves the method of appointment of judges who exercise comprehensive jurisdiction in family law matters. These negotiations have not yet been concluded, and it is uncertain at this point what their final outcome will be.

As well, we are awaiting the evaluation report on the project, which will not be completed until some time in the summer of next year. For these two reasons, I have introduced this bill to extend the life of the court in Hamilton to permit us to have these very important matters resolved before making decisions on the long-term future of the Hamilton family court.

STATUTES REVISION ACT

Hon. Mr. Walker, on behalf of Hon. Mr. McMurtry, moved first reading of Bill 181, An Act to provide for the Consolidation and Revision of the Statutes.

Motion agreed to.

Hon. Mr. Walker: Mr. Speaker, this is the 10th time that the statutes of Ontario will have been revised if this bill is passed. Revisions of the statutes of Ontario have been produced in 1877, 1887, 1897, 1914, 1927, 1937, 1950, 1960 and 1970. The bill would provide the statutory basis for the revision of 1980.

REGULATIONS REVISION ACT

Hon. Mr. Walker, on behalf of Hon. Mr. McMurtry, moved first reading of Bill 182, An Act to provide for the Consolidation and Revision of the Regulations.

Motion agreed to.

Hon. Mr. Walker: Mr. Speaker, the Regulations Act was first enacted in 1944. Consolidations and revisions have been published in the years 1950, 1960 and 1970. The bill would provide the statutory basis for a consolidation and revision at the end of 1980 to coincide with the revised statutes of 1980.

ASSESSMENT AMENDMENT ACT

Mr. Leluk moved first reading of Bill 183, An Act to amend the Assessment Act.

Motion agreed to.

Mr. Leluk: Mr. Speaker, the bill provides an exemption from municipal taxation for additions and improvements to residential property that are designed to aid persons who are physically disabled.

CITY OF NORTH BAY ACT

Mr. Bolan moved first reading of Bill Pr28, An Act respecting the City of North Bay.

Motion agreed to.

CITY OF LONDON ACT

Mr. Van Horne moved first reading of Bill Pr25, An Act respecting the city of London.

Motion agreed to.

ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS ON NOTICE PAPER

Hon. Mr. Wells: Mr. Speaker, I wish to table the answers to questions 325, 343, 344 and 345, and the interim answer to question 333 standing on the Notice Paper.

ORDERS OF THE DAY

PRIVATE MEMBERS’ PUBLIC BUSINESS

REST HOMES

Mr. Blundy moved resolution 35:

That in the opinion of this House the government consider the licensing and regulation of rest homes (domiciliary care homes) in Ontario.

Mr. Blundy: Mr. Speaker, I am grateful to have this opportunity to introduce this resolution today. It is a very simple one, asking that the government license and regulate rest homes.

What is a rest home? A rest home is where supervised living is available to elderly people, former psychiatric patients and handicapped people. These residents are sometimes infirm, perhaps senile, perhaps confused. They do not need expensive medical treatment, they do not need expensive medical equipment, but they must have custodial care and a clean, respectable place in which to live.

Very often we see an elderly person who can no longer live by himself or herself in his or her home. There are not sufficient alternatives to continued residence in one’s own home as ageing proceeds and health problems become more frequent. The elderly may need around-the-clock supervision, but they do not need hospital care or nursing-home accommodation,

We all know how expensive these levels of care are, and the amount of funds provided by the Ministry of Health and/or the Ministry of Community and Social Services to provide these other levels of service.

We have seen in days past where people in society were taken off to asylums and the poorhouse. Thank God we have gone from that position now. We have seen many of these people being brought back into community living, and many without homes. Some of them are able to have some degree of community living in what is known as a rest home or a lodging home.

We have listened to the minister talking about deinstitutionalization. The Minister of Health (Mr. Timbrell) has certainly been talking about this, as has the Minister of Community and Social Services (Mr. Norton), I believe, in a commendable way. However, when many of these people are brought out of the so-called institutions, they end up in a very sad place, a place where they have little or no care. What they need is a place for them to live with custodial or domiciliary care while they pick up the pieces of their lives in the community.

[3:30]

We see the spectre of the elderly no longer able to live in their own homes. We see ex-psychiatric patients back in the community trying to find themselves again. Many of these people have ended up in very sad and very unsatisfactory accommodation. Every one of us can point to so-called rest homes in the province where the care is very minimal and the surroundings are bleak and sometimes not even clean. There are, of course, many rest homes in Ontario that are clean, warm, satisfactory and pleasant places in which to live. This is the position of the rest homes today.

The Minister of Health is saying all across this province that we must cut back in hospital accommodation. We how many beds are being taken out of active treatment so that chronic-care patients can be accommodated. The Ministry of Community and Social Services is trying to do the same thing: to deinstitutionalize people.

We see even in our homes for the aged that the intensive-care treatment sections of these homes are fast taking over most of the accommodation in what were known as homes for the aged. There is a definite need and place in Ontario for well-managed rest homes.

We have seen many reports suggesting that many beds in active-treatment hospitals now are occupied by chronic-care patients, leaving a shortage of active-treatment beds. We have seen reports which have said there is a high percentage of chronic-care beds being occupied, while in nursing homes there are people who do not need that level of care, but could very well be happily accommodated on a lesser level of care. We see where even in nursing homes there are many residents -- and I call them residents rather than patients -- who are in nursing homes but do not need that level of care.

There is a place for patients who need to have domiciliary care, who need to be in a clean, warm and comfortable living accommodation, who need to have their medication supervised and who need to have meals that are nourishing and conducive to continued good health. These are the services which are provided by rest homes in Ontario.

Many people will say the health-care needs of our senior citizens and our special patients are adequately met by the network of care facilities now available. I would like to read an excerpt in this regard. Mr. Dennis Coolican, then chairman of the regional municipality of Ottawa-Carleton, wrote a letter to the Minister of Community and Social Services on August 15, 1978.

He said, “It is our view that the easy solution would be for your ministry to establish another level of care to accommodate elderly people, ex-psychiatric patients and those requiring special care now being served by boarding homes.”

In his reply, on September 28, 1978, the Minister of Community and Social Services admitted: “We are aware that in the last few years there has been a change in the complexion of the resident population in domiciliary hospitals (rest homes). We agree that there is a need to review this program with respect to levels of service and standards of care.”

It is quite evident that the principle of a new, effective and intermediate level of care is being accepted widely. We have seen many reports quoting how the complexion of the resident population in Ontario is changing. There are simply more senior citizens, and thus more elderly people needing residential care.

We know, as the years go by in Ontario, there will be an increasing number of elderly people who are no longer able to maintain themselves in their own homes but who will need supervisory care in a home that is regulated and inspected.

What can be done about the situation as outlined so far? The first thing that must be done is, the Ministry of Community and Social Services and the Ministry of Health must immediately designate responsibility to one or other of the ministries so they can administer and co-ordinate community residential care services. This having been done, the government must license and regulate these homes so they provide the kind of atmosphere required.

A rest home can provide the standard of living that is required for the elderly, the ex-psychiatric patient and the handicapped person in Ontario at greatly less cost than is necessary in our other well-known institutions.

Every area of the province today can give examples of rest homes in existence which give domiciliary care to these types of people. We are unhappy to admit it, but every area has homes of this nature that are a disgrace to the province. They are homes that are not well laid out; homes that are inadequately heated and lighted; homes in which little or no supervision of the inmates or patients is given.

I believe, with proper licensing and regulation of these homes, the ones now providing the services of which we are ashamed will be eliminated, and those that can provide a proper level of custodial care for the elderly and the infirm of the province will prosper.

Regarding the accommodation my colleague the member for Kent-Elgin (Mr. McGuigan) has drawn to my attention an unusual situation in regard to a rest home in his riding where the residents of the home are expected to do the work around the place. This particular rest home even keeps milk cows, and the patients have to look after the cows. Other patients must look after the housework and the cleaning within the institution.

Surely, when they are paying, or their care is being paid for by someone else, they don’t have to do the work as well. This is another situation that obviously would be greatly improved if we had proper licensing and regulation of rest homes.

It has been said that the municipalities of Ontario have been encouraged to inspect and license homes of this nature. That is a very wonderful view, but it isn’t what is happening. What is happening now in the community is that the fire inspector may come around once in a while, or perhaps only on the initial opening of the place, to see if it is contravening fire matters. The department of health will send a person around from time to time to see if the handling of food is done in a careful and clean fashion. This is about the extent to which the municipalities of Ontario have been providing the type of supervision and regulation to which the minister has referred on several occasions as having encouraged them to do. it is an encouragement that is falling on deaf ears in most of the municipalities of Ontario.

There are rest homes or lodging homes throughout the province where the owners or operators are just looking for regulation and supervision so they can institute the proper program and so the poorer rest homes will be eliminated.

There is only one way to go. In one of the ministries or in co-operation between the two ministries, Health and Community and Social Services, a licensing program must be instituted so that those homes which are willing and able to provide a clean, healthy environment for elderly people to live will be satisfied in this province.

I believe there are many people today in the business of operating rest homes who have nothing but the very best intentions in doing so and who have proven that they can operate a rest home that is sufficient to that need.

I want to address the matter of why there should be this form of care in Ontario. We have seen the government having to practise restraint in the hospital system of Ontario to the point where sometimes seriously and critically ill people are not able to get into the hospital. I know that every one of us has had calls about people lying in emergency, awaiting beds. Similarly, there are not any more homes for the aged being built in Ontario, and haven’t been for some years. Those beds that are there, as I previously said, are now becoming full of the intensive-care needs of the elderly.

The Ministry of Health is not providing new licences for nursing homes in most areas of the province; so obviously there is going to have to be some area where the elderly part of the senior citizen group are accommodated. In order to use our dollars most wisely in health care generally in Ontario, we must see that there is this other level of care that will be able to relieve the pressure on the other, much more expensive institutions but still provide for many of our elderly, infirm and handicapped people a decent, clean, comfortable place to live, either for the rest of their lives -- if that is necessary -- or until they can be re-established in health in the community.

I wish to reserve some of my time for closing remarks. I know that many members of this House will want to support this bill, and I am looking forward to their comments on this resolution.

Mr. Acting Speaker: The member for Sarnia has approximately three minutes.

Mr. Dukszta: Mr. Speaker, this is the second resolution on this subject from this side of the House in this session; the term domiciliary care subsumes all types of existing group homes, psychiatric child care, et cetera. This expresses some concern on this side of the House with the existing conditions in group homes. Unfortunately, the government guillotined the previous effort; I hope it won’t do it again.

Helping people with problems in living in the community is laudable; so is the general policy of discharging people from institutions into the community. But the Conservative government’s policy of deinstitutionalization is based on the false economy of cutbacks, not on the reintegration of disadvantaged adults into the community.

This policy of deinstitutionalization without adequate housing, employment counselling and opportunities for social recreation programs and proper aftercare has had a twofold effect: the lowering of basic standards of care for many patients, and an increasing negative reaction from the communities where group homes and boarding homes housing this population are situated. Because of permissive zoning bylaws and availability of readily convertible housing stock, Parkdale and the Annex of Toronto, and other places in the province, have ended up with a significant concentration of these homes.

Long-term patients are now being discharged to a lonely existence, often in a hostile community, without adequate care or support.

[3:45]

The effect of government policy has been to create an uncaring limbo in Parkdale and the Annex communities in Toronto, where those often disturbed and unhappy individuals eke out their existence in boarding homes, lodging houses, bachelorettes and group homes -- in effect, they are forgotten men and women.

Three points need to be established: Psychiatric patients and other disadvantaged individuals -- alcoholics, ex-convicts, et cetera -- should be treated in the community, and provision must be made for programming and funding that make that possible. All municipalities must accept responsibility for their disadvantaged citizens so that community-based treatment is accessible to all the residents of Ontario.

Second, the creation of institutional ghettos like Parkdale must be avoided by permitting the establishment of licensed community-care residences in reasonable proportion to the local population of all municipalities.

Finally, there must be a joint effort by the province and the municipalities to ensure the establishment of province-wide standards and funding support for capital and operating programs, as well as municipal enforcement of bylaws and housing standards. There must be joint development of standards and provision of support for community residential care services, such as group homes and halfway houses. The government should consider the provision of provincial funding to support the local agency operating that special category of boarding and lodging homes.

Deinstitutionalization must mean more than closing hospital beds. It means providing a network of community services to rehabilitate and/or integrate disadvantaged adults into the community with adequate housing as a priority.

Let me tell members how this program could be implemented. Generally, the government of Ontario should take immediate steps (a) to develop standards and provide support for community residential care services such as group homes and halfway houses, (b) consider the provision of provincial funding support for local agencies operating that special category of boarding and lodging homes which cater to emotionally, physically or mentally disadvantaged adults, and (c) provide community support services for the above facilities.

In particular:

1. For the purpose of rationalizing the provision of community residential care services, the government should immediately designate responsibility to a single provincial ministry for the provision of administrative co-ordination of existing and future community residential care services. It doesn’t really matter if it is the Ministry of Community and Social Services or the Ministry of Health.

2. For the purpose of ensuring minimum standards of operation for community care residences, the government should license and regulate all such facilities, especially with regard to staffing recreational and therapeutic programs. Adequate inspection and enforcement procedures should also be developed to ensure compliance with the regulation and licensing requirements.

3. For the purpose of ensuring the appropriate provision of community care residences, the government should (i) devise criteria to define the population in need of community residential care services, (ii) design the services needed to meet the requirements of this population, and (iii) develop provincial funding mechanisms for program, capital and operating costs.

4. For the purposes of solving the problems that have occurred in attempting to locate community care residences, the government should introduce legislation to amend section 35(1) of the Planning Act so as to require municipalities to permit the establishment of licensed community care residences in reasonable proportion to the local populations.

5. For the purpose of ensuring close co-operation between the province and the municipalities, the government should form a community liaison section within the designated ministry to confer with the communities regarding the location, size and type of community residential care facilities in municipalities.

6. For the purpose of ensuring that others with special personal care needs living in boarding homes and lodging homes receive the services they require, the government should encourage municipalities (a) to consider the licensing of a special category of boarding and lodging homes which cater to such adults, and (b) to establish for that special category whatever additional personal care and physical facility municipal standards that may be necessary.

7. For the purpose of promoting the operation of those special boarding and lodging homes by volunteer, nonprofit and municipal agencies, the government should consider funding these agencies for the capital costs of providing such shelter.

8. For the purpose of improving standards of operation in those boarding and lodging homes within this special category which are privately owned and operated, the government should consider providing funds for support services such as public health, social services, community police and educational programs.

9. The government should consider devoting a greater portion of provincial funds to the development of a comprehensive body of community support services, including more appropriate support programs for the physically, mentally or emotionally handicapped or disadvantaged adults.

As a last word, I would like to mention that when the previous resolution was introduced -- though I wasn’t here, I have read the Hansard -- I was shocked to see the reaction of a number of people from the government side, including the Minister of Community and Social Services (Mr. Norton), the Provincial Secretary for Social Development (Mrs. Birch), and the Minister of Health (Mr. Timbrell). It was a negative reaction to the resolution which was introduced. Since I consider it to be a basic responsibility of all those ministries to provide some kind of care for the socially, physically, and mentally disadvantaged adults, I was horrified to see the expression of an uncaring attitude and the ruthless rejection of the resolution and obligation of their own responsibility towards those people.

Hon. Mr. Norton: Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank my colleagues for the rousing round of support as I rose.

I am pleased to speak, albeit briefly, on the resolution of the member for Sarnia this afternoon and to indicate at the outset that this resolution is one which we feel we certainly can be supportive of largely, and I want to address some remarks to that.

I would suggest that, had I been drafting the wording of the resolution, I would have probably made it somewhat rather in terms of the considerations that the government might make in the course of reviewing the concern that has given rise to the resolution.

I think, for example, that in addition to licensing and regulation, other alternatives might be considered: such matters as registration as an alternative to licensing and so on. I believe in some communities that approach can and has achieved essentially the same kind of result that the honourable member has in mind. I will come back to that in a moment.

I would like to respond very briefly to one of the remarks that has been made, which I think is a common assumption that is being repeated here in the Legislature and across the province; that is that there is a connection between the policy of the government to, wherever possible, move persons into the most appropriate level of care and into the community as an alternative to institutionalization.

The assumption that has been repeated this afternoon is that the policy is somehow based upon economic considerations, either primarily or solely. I want to assure the members of this Legislature that that is not the case. It is, I think, a very sound approach that the government has been embarked upon for some time, for humanitarian reasons, not for economic reasons. I think we will see demonstrated that the cost of the appropriate supportive care in the community to persons is often as costly or perhaps more costly than in an institutional setting. Economics is not the determining factor; it has not been and will not be the determining factor in deciding upon the most appropriate and humane course of action. We still have to recognize that in North America, as compared with many other jurisdictions, we institutionalize disproportionately large numbers of our population, whether we are talking of children, the elderly or persons at other stages of their lives. That is the kind of concern that has given rise to the direction we have embarked upon.

I would also like to point out that here we are not specifically addressing group homes. It may have just been a slip of the tongue, but I would point out that what are generally referred to as group homes are, by and large, well regulated and well supervised by my ministry at the present time, regardless of the gestures of the honourable member opposite.

As we consider the concern, as the government will and has been considering the concern reflected in this resolution, we must also bear in mind we do not wish to create -- at least I am assuming this is something shared by the honourable members opposite -- a society in which persons, even though they be discharged from a psychiatric facility, are somehow under constant supervision and “programming” indefinitely into their life, unless the professional assessment is that they do require an ongoing level of care.

It bothers me somewhat that some of the arguments one hears in this kind of debate seem to imply that because a person has been in a psychiatric facility, or has received institutionalized psychiatric care, or care in another type of institution, he might end up being labelled for the rest of his life as someone who is in need for constant supervision and constant programming of his life, whether it be for appropriate recreation or whatever, and I think we have to be --

Mr. Blundy: Well, for some time, not forever.

Hon. Mr. Norton: All I am saying is, let’s be careful that we do not jump into this with that assumption. There may well be individuals who require that, and we must also explore the most appropriate way to provide that support to those individuals in the community.

My personal preference, and I believe, the preference of my colleagues, would be to see that need for support addressed through the use of the generic services that are either in place or being addressed in the communities of this province, as opposed to creating what could end up being another level of institutional care.

The kinds of home support services that are growing very substantially every year across this province could address the needs of these people when they return to the community as well. In this way they would not be segregated, they would not be treated differently from other people in the community and labelled, but they would be addressed on the basis of the level of care or the level of support they may require to live independently.

I specifically made reference to registration in my earlier remarks. I know this does not sit well with some of the honourable members opposite, but I have seen it demonstrated in some municipalities in this province. In fact, through the municipal authority that does exist -- at least it’s been used by a number of municipalities and it has not been challenged -- the municipal authority passes bylaws which regulate and require the registration of such residential accommodations, and it has worked quite effectively.

The city of Kingston is one place I can speak about. It occurred when I was a member of the city council of Kingston and it has really worked quite effectively. It does not provide the support services the honourable members have made reference to, but again the municipalities, with the financial support of the province on a cost-shared 80-20 basis, can and ought to, I believe, where necessary, provide the in-home support service to these individuals, rather than creating a new institution.

It is a danger, I suggest, if we go the route of simply saying, “Why doesn’t the province license, regulate, require program supervision and recreation supervision and the works?” Let’s be careful we not just institutionalize more people.

Bearing those reservations in mind and getting them on the record, that is not the direction we want to go. We do recognize and share the concern that there are some individuals who probably do require a degree of support they may not be getting in some of the accommodation at present. I welcome the opportunity to speak supportively of the resolution, although the government has already begun to review this situation quite extensively, between my ministry and the Ministry of Health, and will do so further.

Without prejudice to the resolution that we seek, my personal feeling is it will inevitably involve some input by the municipalities of the province. This resolution is worded in such a way that it does not lock us into a conclusion before we have completed the review. On this basis, I welcome it and I support it.

[4:00]

Mr. B. Newman: Mr. Speaker, it is indeed a pleasure for me to take part in this debate and to support my colleague in his resolution with respect to licensing and regulation of rest homes -- that is, domiciliary care homes -- in Ontario.

I was very pleased that the Minister of Community and Social Services had some input into this. The ministry has been alerted as to what the concerns of my colleague happen to be. It speaks well when the minister is in the House and speaks to some of these debates.

The member for Sarnia is a very concerned, interested and an extremely dedicated individual, as exemplified by the introduction of this resolution. The resolution deserves to receive the support of this House. It’s to be hoped the licensing and regulation of rest homes will go some way to solving the many problems experienced in the past by patients and their families as well as by medical and support staff.

For example, in checking over the telephone book this afternoon, I noticed under “Rest Homes” -- I will read the list off, Mr. Speaker, to show you that when you look under “Rest Homes” you are not necessarily going to find a rest home -- there is a Beth Kitchen Rest Home, a Bruce Rest Home, a Chateau Park Lodge, Chifor Investments Limited, Elm Lodge Rest Home, Eventide Guest Home, Golden Gate Lodging Home, Howard Avenue Rest Home, La Chaumiere Rest Home, LaSalle Gardens Retirement Community, the Lodge at Country Village, Love Rest Home, Marentette Rest Home, Pine Valley Rest Home, Richmond Lodge, the Rooney Lodge, University Rest Home and Walkerville Rest Home. All of these are listed as rest homes, yet we know they are not rest homes.

The same could be said for nursing homes. There are Beacon Hill Lodges of Canada, Brouillette Manor Limited, Country Village Nursing Home, Essex Nursing Home, Golden Gate Lodging Home, La Chaumiere Rest Home, LaSalle Gardens Retirement Community, Tecumseh Nursing Home and Victoria Rest Home all listed under nursing homes.

Just imagine how confusing it is to an individual looking for some place in which to have their loved one, or a friend or relative, get some decent care. He is confused as to whether it is a nursing home, a rest home, a lodging home, or you name it.

The facilities available in Ontario vary almost as much as do the people in need of care and treatment. We have hospitals with chronic care; we have rest homes; we have lodging homes; we have homes for the aged; we have group homes; we have boarding homes. The difficulty of identity is compounded by the fact that some of the facilities are the responsibility of the Minister of Health, while others fall under the jurisdiction of the Minister of Community and Social Services. Still others are the responsibility of the local board of health. There is no clear definition of what constitutes chronic care, or what is equivalent to custodial care.

Throughout this province there is a considerable concern about the lack of appropriate and adequate chronic care and nursing home space and domiciliary care homes such as rest homes. There are prolonged delays both for admission and, in some instances, for treatment of the individual to be placed in this type of facility.

Regulations are necessary; so are guidelines with respect to assessment of the individual, of the home, as well as reassessment. If rest homes are licensed and regulated, then this will go some way to ensure that people receive the appropriate care and that facilities are not overburdened with patients who would be better cared for elsewhere or, alternatively, need more medical or paramedical care than is available in a specific location.

Guidelines for assessment and subsequent reassessment are also vitally important and should be laid down. Each and every assessment should be based on the assumption that all types of care are available. Social and economic perspectives should not be taken into consideration. The prime factor -- the only factor -- is the extent and the type of medical attention necessary to meet the needs of the individual. Each assessment should be carried out by a qualified person who is very familiar with the medical history and current condition of the patient or the resident.

Psychiatric considerations cannot, of course, be overlooked. Diagnosis and monitoring of existing conditions are essential. Potentiality serious aspects of the individual’s general health must be taken into account, as well as the need for therapeutic and/or educational programs, even those which may be of comparatively short duration.

Drug programs need to be carefully monitored on an ongoing basis. The present confusion about assessment and allocation of patients cannot be allowed to continue. Our health services are hard-pressed, and no doubt this situation will worsen. We must clarify the guidelines with respect to the operation of the various types of facilities and care available so that everyone who needs care receives the kind of care he needs, while at the same time avoiding overcare, which places an excessive burden on our already over-strained resources.

While these problems with respect to rest homes and so forth are being experienced and have been experienced for a considerable time throughout the province, I have specific information available with respect to the situation in Essex county.

As the result of a suggestion made by the county district health council in the summer of 1977, a bed utilization task force was established and a discussion paper on bed utilization in Essex county was released in October of this year. I’d like to take this opportunity to bring some of these recommendations to your attention, Mr. Speaker.

The service carried out was quite extensive and detailed. No doubt, many of its findings are similar to those which would emerge from surveys made in other parts of Ontario. The bed utilization survey dealt solely with the medical care requirements of the patients and residents in institutional beds, be they any of the categories I have mentioned. Assessors were specifically instructed not to let social or economic considerations enter into this evaluation.

As to the recommendations, it was recommended that alternatives to institutional care be developed and supported. A geriatric day-care program, emphasizing both treatment and social activities, could be instrumental in keeping many patients and residents out of the institutional care system. Home-care programs, providing professional as well as custodial care, would provide a definite preventive alternative to institutional care and should be expanded to include chronic home care.

Palliative care programs, providing care at home as well as in the hospital, would reduce the institutional bed needs, while providing more appropriate types of care to the dying. Foster homes, satellite homes and other such arrangements could be of great assistance. All these programs would help to minimize the need for institutional beds.

It was also recommended that the Ministry of Health review its extended health-care program. Extended-care forms need to be reviewed, as do assessment forms and procedures. The consolidation of extended-care services under one ministry is a possibility which should not be overlooked. The survey discovered that more than 10 per cent of the cases reviewed would fall into the category of people needing heavy extended care. It was recommended that the Ministry of Health should recognize the existence of this category of patient and that an appropriate institutional level of care be developed. This new level of care would be reimbursed at a lower level than chronic care but at a higher level than extended care.

This is of particular importance in our discussion today. It was recommended by that committee that consideration be given to the regulation of rest homes in order to provide reimbursement, monitoring arrangements for the care provided, standardized alternatives to homes for the aged and nursing home care.

Mr. Acting Speaker: The honourable member’s time has expired.

Mr. B. Newman: If I may continue for a moment, Mr. Speaker, I am almost finished.

Such regulations and monitoring would greatly assist referrals from other levels of care and help to alleviate the present situation where there is some financial pressure to place people in nursing homes and homes for the aged rather than in rest homes.

I strongly recommend the resolution presented by the member for Sarnia and hope it will he adopted by this House.

Mr. Cooke: Mr. Speaker, I am happy to see the member’s resolution before us, and I am very pleased to participate in the debate.

I suppose this is a follow-up debate to the resolution from the member for Yorkview (Mr. Young) which was along similar lines. Perhaps his resolution is a little more comprehensive and more specific to a very serious problem here in Metropolitan Toronto, but I do want to comment briefly on it.

When we talk about lodging homes, we are talking about various types of residences, which would include the elderly, many ex-psychiatric patients and many mentally retarded individuals, of which some would be very young.

In the debate on the resolution from the member for Yorkview, the Minister of Health (Mr. Timbrell) stated that the type of residents who enter rest homes and lodging homes really don’t need any kind of care and, if they do need care, they should be in homes for special care, hospitals or nursing homes. He indicated quite clearly he felt these residents did not need care, and therefore the homes could be adequately regulated by municipalities through local bylaws.

If the Minister of Health and the Minister of Community and Social Services (Mr. Norton), who is here, visit Windsor in the near future, I suggest they come with me and visit some of the rest homes and lodging homes we have in my community. Maybe the minister could take a look at the residents who live in the homes and at the types of programs being offered, and then determine whether regulation is needed.

As the member for Windsor-Walkerville (Mr. B. Newman) mentioned in his opening comments, the Windsor and Essex District Health Council has done a bed utilization study which produced some very revealing statistics. I have talked about some of them in the House in the past, but I would like to go over some of them again, because I think they indicate the problem very clearly.

The bed utilization study indicated that only 65.1 per cent of the residents of nursing homes in extended-care beds were properly placed, and that another 26 per cent or 248 individuals could be in what they call residential care, which refers to the rest homes and lodging homes or homes for the aged run by the Ministry of Community and Social Services. Clearly, 35 per cent were improperly placed and 26 per cent of the total could be placed in rest homes and lodging homes.

As a result of the backup in nursing homes, there is a one-year waiting list to get into these homes in my community and in many areas across the province. We also find, because of the waiting list to get into nursing homes, that chronic-care beds in our hospitals are being improperly used; that only 37.9 per cent of those in chronic-care beds were properly placed; that a full 58 per cent could be placed in nursing-home beds. But, as I said, nursing-home beds are filled, often with residents who could well be in rest homes and lodging homes.

The end result is that active-treatment beds are being used by chronic-care patients who are waiting for chronic-care beds and, because these are filled with inappropriate patients, they cannot find the right kind of care either.

[4:15]

What I am saying is we have a health-care system throughout this province that is being backed up because the cheaper forms of care, the alternatives, have not been put in place. One of the alternatives is the rest homes and lodging homes. Rest homes and lodging homes would be a less expensive form of care than, say, active-treatment beds or chronic beds or even nursing-home beds. That type of statistic and that type of information should appeal to the present government because of its intentions to balance the budget. If for no reason other than economical reasons, the government should very seriously consider using rest homes and lodging homes as an important alternative to the traditional institutional forms of care.

The social planning council in my community recommended, I believe a year ago, and before that, that rest homes and lodging homes should be regulated and recreation and rehabilitation programs should become an integral part of a program at rest homes and lodging homes.

The mental health council for Essex and Windsor has also made recommendations. I understand, because there is no provincial regulation, that this particular body has to spend a lot of its time investigating complaints of residents and families of residents in rest homes and lodging homes. The other government-funded agencies that look into complaints at rest homes and lodging homes are the health units. They look primarily at health problems and how clean the particular home is and so forth.

When we’re talking about alternatives, we have not only to look at rest and lodging homes but, to make sure the proper types of residents are in rest homes and lodging homes, we should also look at an even cheaper form of care and probably at the most important alternative -- chronic home care. While we were promised chronic home care in the Windsor-Essex area as part of the rationalization program for hospitals, that program has not been implemented. We are now told we won’t be getting it for two or three years.

If the government is to develop an overall health strategy, it has to begin by implementing chronic home care all across this province so that we can begin to take some of the residents who are currently in rest homes and lodging homes and, I would suggest, homes for the aged, who could make it at home and succeed at home but are currently in institutions because we don’t have that type of home-care program.

Some residents could make it on their own if public housing were available for them. I would suggest one of the alternatives the government has to look at is the establishment of public housing for those residents under the age of 60. Right now, many of the ex-psychiatric patients go into rest homes and lodging homes only because they can’t afford to live in private housing. If they can find private housing, they have to live in slum housing because of the disability pensions that are provided for by this government.

I would suggest, if the government is really looking at proper use of institutions and preventive programs, it should look at providing public housing, geared-to-income housing, for residents who are under the age of 60 and single. We do not have that kind of housing in this province right now.

I had a young woman who came into my office earlier this year. She had been in and out of the hospital. I believe she was in her late twenties. She had been in and out of the Metropolitan Hospital psychiatric ward on several occasions suffering from very deep depression. She brought in with her a letter from her psychiatrist. I later spoke with the psychiatrist, who indicated one of the contributing factors to her continued relapses and rehospitalization was the fact that she was living in a very small bachelor apartment, which was not properly decorated, and not in a good building at all in one of the loneliest areas of the city of Windsor, an area that has a high crime rate. The poor atmosphere and environment in which this young woman lived was a very substantial contributing factor to her constant readmission to Metropolitan Hospital’s psychiatric ward.

We wrote to the Windsor housing authority and to the present Minister of Housing and tried to get some policy changes. There are very few units available in the city of Windsor for these types of people. I asked questions in the Legislature of the Minister of Housing, and his answer was a flat “no”; they would not provide this type of housing in the province. I think that’s a real shame. So what we have instead is the placement of individuals in unregulated facilities. That’s what they are -- unregulated.

The Minister of Community and Social Services points to Kingston. Maybe I could point to the city of Windsor and many other municipalities that do have bylaws but very inadequate bylaws; they talk only about fire regulations, square feet per person, cleanliness and that type of thing, but they do not talk about very basic things such as rehabilitation, recreation and quality of care. Any kind of regulation and inspection in the province would have to deal with those problems.

There is great confusion in this province over the different types of facilities. We have rest homes, lodging homes, homes for the aged, nursing homes. When families are looking for placements for a relative they can no longer care for at home, there is great confusion as to which type of institution they should go into. I’ve talked to many of my constituents who place relatives, and go for pre-placement visits, at rest homes and they feel they’re actually placing the relatives in nursing homes.

Mr. Acting Speaker: The honourable member’s time has expired.

Mr. Cooke: Okay. I didn’t get through most of what I wanted to discuss.

I encourage members of this assembly to support the resolution, even though it is a somewhat watered-down resolution from the one I would like to see. I also suggest that at some point we will also have to deal with the problem of profit versus nonprofit in these types of institutions.

Mr. Lane: Mr. Speaker, I rise to speak in support of this resolution in principle. The resolution before the House this afternoon appears to be a good one in theory, but it has raised a good many questions in my mind because it’s very vague in its content. It doesn’t say very much in words; so I’m not quite sure what the member has in mind.

If this resolution means people can be assured of good standards of rest homes then I give it my personal support. If, however, it’s to be done at the expense of community volunteers, then I’m not so sure this is the kind of legislation that is beneficial to issue from this House. It maybe should be dealt with more at the municipal level.

The Ontario government has shown its commitment to the support of improving the lives of all these people. Program funding has been extended to municipalities to assist them in building and maintaining rest homes. Many ministries are involved in providing benefits to people requiring housing or medical assistance, home care, nursing and vacation care, assisted housing and drug benefits. These are all solid indications of commitments to positive social programs.

All of us are aware that the next 20 years will bring enormous social changes as our society ages. One of our major efforts to deal with this situation is to promote the expansion of community-based services to support the elderly and physically handicapped.

The member for Sarnia mentioned that either the Minister of Health or the Minister of Community and Social Services would have to have the authority to license and regulate these proposed rest homes. I would like to add one more ministry there -- the Ministry of Housing.

The last speaker mentioned housing. In the north, where we have large, sparsely populated areas, as there are in Mr. Speaker’s riding and mine, one of the greatest concerns of elderly people is where will they go when they can’t look after themselves. We all have our own parts of the province where we’ve lived and made contributions to; we want to stay as near home as possible and yet, because of the lack of population, there is no way a nursing home by itself, or subsidized housing or rest homes, could be a viable operation.

I think we have to put together some kind of program that will involve these three ministries to provide a total-needs service in the north where the population is sparse and so our older people will not have to fear being dragged off 300, 400 or 500 miles to a larger urban area to get into a rest home or nursing home. So in my own riding at this particular time I am working with those three ministries to try to bring this type of a total-needs complex on stream. We will be starting, hopefully come spring, with the first phase, which will be the rent-geared-to-income housing.

I point this out because I think that is one of the greatest social problems our elderly people in the north are facing at this point.

I think we legislate too much sometimes. We have a lot of people in municipalities who want to make a contribution. In my area I have service clubs and many other people wanting to make contributions to physically or mentally handicapped children, or to the elderly people, et cetera. I think it is unfortunate if we legislate to the point this type of commitment is not allowed.

Home, as defined in the Homes for the Aged and Rest Homes Act, means a home for the aged or public rest home established and maintained under the act. Private home care is also included under this act. The regulations pertaining to private homes prescribe the conditions to be maintained within those residences, in which persons may be placed for private care. I must also stress that the regulations provide for inspections of private care homes.

As you can see, there are homes that are being monitored. I do not deny that every home in Ontario is not licensed and regulated by the province. Municipalities maintain and enforce their own standards, and there is always a possibility that conditions in some may not have reached the high levels at which all of us would wish them to be.

Where do we draw the line between defining the role and responsibility of establishing a rest home or a private home or a hoarding house facility? Does the opposition want us to turn the province into one enormous conglomeration of institutions? For people who have no choice, any form of rest home would automatically be considered as an institution. This could be a real detriment to people who want to return to normal life. No matter how good or bad the place may be, there are certain popular misconceptions about institutions that are not always fairly applied to the residents. This could deny them the opportunity to live in the community regardless of their mental or physical infirmities.

This is a serious matter, Mr. Speaker. For families which must make decisions on behalf of elderly people or relatives this could be a particularly distressing situation.

All levels of government have a responsibility to help those people who can’t help themselves. I would just like to say that in my lifetime I have had more satisfaction out of helping to provide programs in communities for physically handicapped people, or for mentally retarded children or for senior citizens, than I have from any other things I have worked on. I feel it is very rewarding and very self-satisfying. I personally would like to voice my thoughts; the member has given us something to discuss this afternoon that is very near and dear to my heart.

How should we do it? Of course, everybody might have different thoughts on that. I would like to point out that our government over the years has moved ahead rather rapidly in supplying services to people who can’t supply the services for themselves and can't take care of their own needs. In dollars and cents, I don’t know how many dollars we spend to provide necessary drugs for elderly people.

Hon Mr. Norton: We’ve done a better job than anywhere else in North America.

Mr. Warner: Baloney.

Hon. Mr. Norton: There is no question about it.

Mr. Lane: Certainly our rent-geared-to-income housing in the north -- and I don’t refer to large urban areas because I don’t pretend to know, but in the north it is certainly well received. It is one of the best ways I know to keep people together for as long as possible. We all know that if a couple can’t stay together in a subsidized apartment they may have to be taken to a nursing home and then they are separated. I think this is unfortunate, in that in many cases one partner has to go into a nursing home and the other a rest home or something and they are miles apart.

[4:30]

I would like to support this resolution in principle, Mr. Speaker. I like to think my colleagues in the various ministries will support my idea to try and provide total service needs throughout northern Ontario so no senior citizen need worry about being more than 50 miles from home at any given time in the sunset years of life. Within 50 miles may sound like a lot to people who live in a city like Toronto, but at home 50 miles doesn’t mean too much. One can jump in the car after lunch, drive down to the nursing home or wherever mother or dad is, have a visit and be back home in time for dinner.

If that is the distance we are talking about then our people are not going to be divorced from their families and friends when they get to the point in life when they shouldn’t be. By placing them 300 or 400 miles away we are simply shortening their lifetime and visits with family members and friends are going to be few and far between.

This is a very worthwhile topic. The minister has made some comments on it with which I agree. I know our government is committed to doing the best possible job in the future for our senior citizens and physically handicapped people.

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank you for the opportunity to take part in this debate this afternoon.

Mr. Speaker: The member for Kitchener-Wilmot. You have three and a half minutes.

Mr. Sweeney: Three and a half minutes. Thank you.

Hon. Mr. Norton: That’s too long.

Mr. Sweeney: The first thing I want to say in response to the minister is that I was quite pleased to hear at least the tail-end of his remarks, which seemed to be saying he recognizes the particular need my colleague the member for Sarnia (Mr. Blundy) is drawing to his attention. If I understood him correctly he was saying he would at least support some form of registration of rest homes. That is a very positive step in the right direction; all we are asking is that the minister take a couple more steps. We would be quite prepared to accept that as step number one, and I want to compliment the minister on that.

I would like to comment very briefly on the comments of the last speaker and to assure him the members of our party, as of his, are concerned about the over-institutionalization taking place in our society. We want to support any move that would get our people, whether we are talking about the retarded, offenders of the legal system, the handicapped or the aged, out of these large institutions. That is precisely what this resolution is all about.

What we are saying is we need a variety of options. This resolution is saying here is one of those other options, but if that option is going to be effective certain conditions must be present. The members of this Legislature must make certain the families of the aged who would want to use the option of rest homes, and the aged themselves, are assured that the option they are going to use is a suitable one. That is really all we are saying. We are not saying we want more institutionalization, we are saying exactly the opposite; we want to be sure the alternatives to institutionalization are good ones.

My colleague’s resolution clearly reinforces the statement we have made so often to the minister, which is that we agree with him that community alternatives should be put in place. We have also said a number of times to the minister that those alternatives must be there and they must be of high quality before we can persuade anyone to use them.

I don’t think my constituency office differs from that of any other member in this Legislature in receiving requests from the families for suitable places for relatives to reside in their declining years. These families are looking for a variety of places, depending on the ability of the aged relatives to look after themselves.

In my community, the older people and their families want them to stay in the community. Kitchener is a beautiful city. People live there all their lives and they don’t want to move away as they get older. The township of Wilmot is a most hospitable and pleasant place to live. The people who have lived there all of their lives don’t want to have to move away when they get older.

We want to be able to offer quality rest homes. We want to be sure that the needs of the people in those rest homes are guaranteed. I certainly support my colleague’s motion and hope the government members will support it as well.

Mr. Blundy: It was very good to hear the support for this resolution from a number of the members of the Legislature today. I know there were several very good ideas brought forth that I had not included in my initial remarks, and I want to thank members for that.

I was really pleased to hear the views of the minister in this matter. He did say the matter is being looked at and there will possibly be some form of registration for rest homes. I believe the people of Ontario want that, because as has been pointed out by me and other speakers today there are both good and had. The good ones are obviously filling a need in our whole system, a need that is less expensive than most of the other levels of care.

Also, a rest home can make it possible for an elderly person particularly to stay in their own area rather than go to a county home or something of that nature. That is another point in favour of it.

With these few remarks to wind up this very interesting discussion, I want to thank those who have supported me and I hope we will see some action taken in the way of assuring good quality rest homes in Ontario.

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker.

PENSIONS

Mr. Mackenzie moved resolution 36:

That in the opinion of this House the government of Ontario should take immediate action to provide for the full portability and protection of pension benefit credits and specifically, that the government of Ontario should introduce legislation that would (a) reduce the vesting period for pension benefits to five years of service, (b) ensure full portability for terminated employees through the establishment of a government administered central pension agency to which all vested employer contributions and locked-in employee contributions could be transferred and which would maintain records, invest the funds and pay accrued benefits on retirement, and (c) establish a mandatory system of pension plan termination guarantees that would protect the pension benefit credits where private pension plans are terminated, in particular as a result of plant closure or relocation.

Mr. Mackenzie: Speaking in support of my resolution on pensions, I want to make it very clear at the outset we have not tried to deal with the many deficiencies in private insurance that exist in Ontario today. I am talking about private insurance in terms of private pensions.

There are many shortcomings. Two near the top of the list, which I haven’t tried to cover are adequacy of coverage for widows and for women in the home as well as the work force; and the whole question of adequacy in terms of the increase in the cost of living for almost all of those covered under private pension plans. There are a number of others but I think these are two areas also in much need of some action.

I want to make it clear as well that by reason of private plan deficiencies and because of the need for portability -- a great need given the new lifestyles today, which emphasize the need for additional protection and some uniformity of coverage across this province -- and probably above all because of the need to establish the priority we feel those who have reached the status of senior citizen deserve because of their contribution to all of us in building our province, we need and should be looking at a comprehensive public pension plan to reduce the role of the thousands of private plans and companies involved to little more than auxiliary coverage to those who can afford it.

While this may provoke screams of outrage from private enterprise types, very powerful arguments can be made to support this particular position.

I find it fascinating, in going over the background on this, that in 1926, at the outset of our first old age public pension plan, several MPs in Ottawa argued that a means-tested benefit of $20 a month would undermine thrift. The Senate went so far as to chuck out the legislation because its members argued that the modest public provision for security for seniors would destroy the incentive for personal saving and for hard work.

Mr. Laughren: Despite their lifetime careers.

Mr. Mackenzie: Since those senators were all Liberal and Conservative appointments and in view of some of the positions I have heard on a variety of social issues in this House, I wonder at times if some of the present members aren’t reincarnations of those Neanderthals of the 1920s.

Mr. Eaton: Why be nasty? I think we might even support you today,

Mr. Mackenzie: The argument heard for private saving today, the argument that adequate public pensions somehow conflict with individual thrift, is really from the same family of arguments we had in the 1920s. It seems to take a long time to move a very small way.

Many pensioners have come to the conclusion that the wages sacrificed to pay for a company plan do not produce the retirement security which they have a right to expect in return. If the social security system has reduced the incentive to save, as some would tell us today, the private pension system has perpetuated the illusion that additional private saving is not necessary. Economists have painstakingly calculated the savings lost to the economy because of social security. In my opinion, they would perform a better service by calculating the savings which did not take place because the employer pensions have not measured up to expectations.

At least the security provided by old age pensions and the Canadian Pension Plan has not proved to be an illusion. It’s not difficult in Ontario to understand why providing pensions for the retired has always been an important issue; indeed in all of Canada, not just Ontario. The extent to which we are prepared to secure comfortable and satisfying living conditions for the generation which has built our prosperity is a tangible measure, and I think a true one, of social justice. When we establish arrangements for meeting the pension needs of a retiring wage earner or a woman whose main work has been in the home, we reflect, I think, our assumptions about their rightful position in society and our responsibilities toward them and the value of the contribution that they have made. The measure of social justice is inevitably seen by individual pensioners as a measure of their own worth.

Pension reforms have all too often been as a result of bitterness engendered by society’s failure to respect the contribution that seniors have made by providing them with coverage for even their own basic needs.

As I said at the outset, we are not trying to deal with all of the problems. One of the reasons this resolution is on the Order Paper is because we have been waiting so long for the Royal Commission on the Status of Pensions in Ontario. I do hope when it files its report it will not be a cop-out and that it will come to grips with some of the problems that are perceived by almost all but those who just don’t want to see. I acknowledge that we have made improvements in the years since the 1920s, but I have to remind my free enterprise friends that it’s significant that almost all of the improvements have been in the public area when it comes to pensions.

In recent months some spokesmen for the private insurance industry, alarmed, I think, at their own failure to protect the value of private savings and pensions in an inflationary period, have called for limitations on the cost-of-living protection which some employer-sponsored plans, admittedly mainly in the public sector, have been able to provide. As usual, I find it a self-interest argument, and also, as usual, at the expense of the workers involved; an argument that seems to be the order of the day.

Indeed, where private interests used to lead in the race to see who could be the best Scrooge, they may very well be followers today, second only to this government in terms of people-bashing through budget restraints and cutbacks in essential services that affect these same people. The general weakness of employer pension plans in the private sector has been revealed to thousands of retirees who have discovered that their benefits cannot sustain the standard of living they had anticipated when they went into retirement. The current period of rather extensive industrial layoffs is demonstrating to thousands more that their company pensions are virtually worthless unless they are at least 45 years of age and have 10 years of service.

[4:45]

I am pretty sure most members of this House, if they are involved in any kind of a relatively heavy case load, have had an increase in calls from constituents who were relying on private plans for their future. In the ones who have talked to me at least, the anxiety and the disillusion is real.

The private plan was always seen as an extra measure of security and comfort in old age over the bare-bones survival allowed through the public plans we now have. Suddenly this is gone, and the shock sort of jolts their faith in the Conservative ethic. This government, in my honest opinion, will be making a very grave mistake if it is either too callous, too unthinking or too stupid to realize and react to this fact of modern life.

My resolution deals with three of the current shortcomings of the private pension plans, albeit three very important ones, and three on which the trade union movement, among other groups, has been very anxious to see some action.

In the first place, I think the resolution removes the straitjacket on obtaining private coverage through the 10 years-and-age combination. The simple five-year vesting provision, coupled with a government-administered central pension agency, for the first time allows some portability with protection or workers in the province. Perhaps just as important as the principle that pension benefits are deferred wages is the need to recognize that portability of pension credits is essential if working people are to be able to make rational choices about moving from job to job, as well as being able to accumulate sufficient pension credits to provide for adequate retirement income. Earlier vesting would not only provide for greater portability, but it would also go a long way to ensuring that more workers would actually receive pension benefits.

Although on fairly short notice I wasn’t able to obtain any Canadian studies which attempt to determine the difference between pension plan coverage and the actual receipt of pension plan benefits, I did come across some American evidence that suggested the problem is very alarming.

For example, pension expert Professor M. C. Bernstein has said, “The losses of the many provide the funds with which the payoff is made to the lucky few, just as at any honest racetrack.” Ralph Nader, back in 1973, said that usually only one half of the people covered by pensions will ever collect a penny. The United States House of Representatives, in a study of pension plans in low-wage industries, found that only one out of 10 employees could expect to receive a pension.

There is little reason to believe the situation in Canada is much better. It is quite possible for a worker in Ontario -- and this is a case I have dealt with, a personal example -- to go through his working life with four or five or six employers, which is the standard in many cases now, and never be able to achieve vested status. This obviously has to change in this province.

The precedent of moving to more liberal vesting requirements has been recognized in Manitoba, which has established a vesting requirement after 10 years of service. If one province can introduce a progressive vesting standard based solely on a service requirement, then other jurisdictions can do the same in order to guarantee and protect employees’ pension entitlements. As a result of this, the worker is not locked into a job without satisfaction or future. Through moves or transfers he or she can find the most satisfying job, which is also without losing future security. The five-year vesting goes a long way to this end.

I believe also that the worker should have the option to have the total contributions transferred to the central agency when leaving a place of employment or carried into a plan at a new place of employment if such provision exists in the new plan. I also happen to think that an added benefit of such legislation would result in a much improved degree of standardization in existing private plans. A worker who is entitled to a vested benefit should have, at least, the option to be able to transfer his benefit to a new employer’s fund, if that is possible, or transfer his accrued vested benefits after termination to a central pension agency.

The reasons for enacting a central pension agency are basically, I think, as follows.

One, a worker who has several changes of employment and does not make successive transfers of benefits will be forced to deal with the problems of collecting pensions from several different sources.

Two, if the transfers are made between private pension funds, problems will arise because of the different actuarial assumptions between the plans. Certainly the administrative costs of individual pension plans would be reduced if we had the central agency.

A central pension agency already exists in permissive form in the Pension Benefits Act. All that is required is it be enacted that there be the additional capability of being able to invest the funds received. Interestingly enough -- I’ve been doing a little checking -- when Ontario first introduced the proposal the Financial Post strongly endorsed it. To take a quote out of an article, “If a pension is considered to be a form of deferred pay, why make its payment contingent upon staying with the same employer for a specific length of time?” the Post asked.

It went on to make the following suggestion: “To facilitate the transfer of pension credits from one plan to another when an employee changes jobs, the merits of setting up a central agency to hold such credits and thus ensure portability should be re-examined.” Even Geoffrey Calvert, the staunch defender of the private pension system, came to the conclusion that the transferability and portability of pension credits could only be accomplished either through registered retirement savings plans or a central pension agency which would be the only other solution.

The investment policies of the central pension agency should be supervised by a board made up of government, labour and employer representatives. The tragedy is the pension legislation in many jurisdictions has permitted the pension authorities for many years to establish such a central pension agency. Given the poor and restricted vesting and portability provisions of most private pension plans, it is all the more imperative that the permissive nature of the pension legislation be activated to establish a central pension agency and clearing house. It would be desirable to require employers, under certain circumstances, to transfer pension credits to this public pension agency; to record, transfer and pay pension benefits.

We have not spelled out all of the details of a central agency, but it is also obvious that openness and a representative makeup of authority is crucial. My resolution also calls for an end to the tragedies that befall so many workers who find the plan they thought they had is suddenly insolvent or non-existent. It does not matter, in my opinion, whether there is mismanagement or deliberate milking of a plan. There has to be protection for a worker’s future when a plan is terminated, particularly as a result of plant closure or relocation. While Canada and Ontario have stricter funding requirements than the United States, it is still necessary to recognize the reality that pension plans are being terminated with fund deficiencies.

Perhaps the most notorious example is the recent example of Prestolite in Sarnia. The hardships and the tragedy that closing generated should not be allowed to happen again. I suggest to you, we have had far too many Prestolites and it is unforgivable, in my opinion, that this government has not acted before this to plug that loophole.

Either the government devises legislation which ensures the liabilities for a particular plan be extended to the ultimate corporate owners -- I’m thinking of the branch plant economy when I say that -- or it should set up a form of termination insurance similar to that of the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation in the United States. The termination insurance provisions in the US constitute a recognition in public policy that an employer who establishes a pension plan cannot, from that point on, isolate himself from the financial consequences of the promises made.

Because of the movement of plants, as well as of workers, from one part of the country to another, the government of Ontario should aim to co-operate with the other provinces and the federal government in establishing a mandatory system of contingent liability insurance against the termination of private group pension plans. There are those more able than I to work out the details of the form of insurance we need, financed by the employer and handled through the central pension agency or whatever other mechanism, although I happen to think the central pension agency is the best approach.

We are dealing here with a resolution, not a bill, and as I understand this House and its procedures that means we are dealing with the principle involved with some of the specifics of the issue without all of the minute clauses or clarifications necessary in a bill. We found it preferable to deal with the three major points regarding deficiencies I am making here via a resolution rather than trying to draft a bill.

I think what we have done with the resolution also allows for flexibility in approach. In my opinion the resolution deals with one of the most important weaknesses in the way we treat workers and their protection following their working lives and as senior citizens. It is a glaring deficiency in the private sector and it is important that we provide the coverage and protection outlined in my resolution.

I say to the members of this House as candidly as I can, and with the utmost urgency, in spite of all the reservations I have about propping up the private insurance sector people need this kind of help, this kind of coverage, and I am certainly hoping the members of this House will consider supporting the resolution.

Mr. McCaffrey: I would like to compliment the member, Mr. Speaker, for two reasons: first, for bringing together before us a matter dealing with pensions, underlining the importance of this great pension debate; second, for putting it in the form of a resolution, which as the member himself alluded at the end of his comments gives us some flexibility in talking about the good aspects of it.

I am supportive of much of the resolution, yet I can see at the outset it poses two very real problems for all of us when we discuss the matter of pensions.

Let’s be candid: this is a complex question for all elected members, indeed for all laymen in society. When we talk about portability, pension benefit credits, portability for terminated employees, vested employer contributions, locked-in employee contributions, et cetera, we know darned well we are in a technical area in which none of us has any real expertise. it is important for us to be aware of this problem and to make sure the broad debate on pensions doesn’t become the sole preserve of the actuaries, accountants and other specialists in the community.

The very complexity of the field and the extent of its impact leads many reformers to focus on several aspects of pension policy in isolation from the overall framework. This, in turn, encourages narrow responses and the cumulative effect is to deflect attention away from the broader and fundamental relationships between pension arrangements and their social, political and economic systems.

Effective reform must first define the issues in their broader terms in order to develop a comprehensive framework within which changes may be evaluated. Piecemeal revisions will simply aggravate the current lack of understanding which underlies much of the difficulty in pension policy formation.

For my part, I approach the topic with a view to reform and improvement. Nonetheless, I hold some rigid convictions; or if it isn’t too presumptuous to say, I approach the topic with my philosophical framework intact. My fundamental starting point is to state both the obligation and the right still enjoyed by individuals in our country to keep as much of their own money as possible to provide for their own retirement in their own way, exercising their own good judgement.

Next I recognize the obligations of employers to provide the best retirement plans possible. Prevailing rates of inflation and the demographic realities in our country demand this of them. Most have faced this challenge, many private sector companies have been leaders, but those who ignore their ultimate social responsibilities must know the risk: that inevitably some level of government, the state, will rush in if they fail to respond.

[5:00]

Mr. Wildman: What’s the matter with the insurance companies?

Mr. McCaffrey: When the state makes obligations in the field of pensions, they deny us some of our fundamental liberties.

We’ve got national commitments in the field of pensions; they should be maintained and improved where necessary, but in my view limited to providing a basic level or retirement income. Let’s make clear our view of the world, when we talk about pension reform. Every time we permit the state --

Mr. Kerrio: Clark’s going to cut that out.

Mr. McCaffrey: -- to take away more or otherwise manage more of our money, we are less free.

Mr. Kerrio: No more pensions in Ottawa.

Mr. McCaffrey: To knowingly concur in such arrangements is to admit that the state can better protect our needs and manage our affairs. I reject that.

Mr. Warner: It’s fun to be poor.

Mr. McCaffrey: Turning now to the resolution and the matter of vesting --

Mr. Mackenzie: Back to the 1920s.

Mr. McCaffrey: -- let’s examine the vesting rules currently in existence. The basic rules for vesting are provided for under the current legislation, that is, vesting upon the attainment of age 45 and having 10 years of service with your employer. This is the minimum that may exist for any pension plan in Ontario. However, many plans have established vesting provisions far superior to this minimum under law, such as 10 years of service or other various graded schedules. These have been established principally through negotiations between unions and employers, and other employers have followed.

Other jurisdictions in Canada, with legislation substantially similar to ours, have also considered the matter of improvement in vesting standards through legislation. One of the problems that could be created and which would cause difficulties for national employers would be a different standard of vesting in each jurisdiction -- this has been a matter of concern to the Canadian Association of Pension Supervisory Authorities -- therefore any legislative action should be as uniform as possible.

Improvements in vesting standards are necessary, but before they’re done the social and economic implications of these changes must be understood and acceptable to those who pay the costs of a private pension plan, be it solely the responsibility of the employer or jointly with the employees. In contributory pension plans, employees must contribute a part of their salary to the plan. In many situations, younger, shorter-service employees expect a refund of their contributions on termination of their employment rather than having a deferred vested benefit payable many years down the road.

Employers, therefore, would be discouraged if vesting requirements are too strict. This is all the more important given what I think is the fundamental starting point, that we want to encourage private pension plans; too costly a change would make many employers feel they could not afford to install a pension plan, or that if they did they would have to restrict the membership.

Legislation should only set vesting at a minimum level. These considerations lead me to recommend, by way of an amendment, that vesting be established at five years, with a 40-year age limit.

With respect to portability that is the right to take your entitlement with you to your next employer, that is already permitted under the terms of the act. It is possible, if pension plans permit it, for the pension benefit credit to be transferred to the plan of the new employer, to be used to purchase a deferred annuity from an insurer, or to have the credit placed in a registered retirement savings plan.

The law does not require this to be done, but it certainly makes it possible to do it.

An example of true portability is the Canadian Life Insurance Association portability plan, which allows an employee to transfer funds from one employer to another and obtain a credit for service. The objective of this plan is that employees will reach retirement and obtain a pension which is based on all of their years of work. Fifteen insurance companies will have this plan in effect by the end of this year and another 35 companies are committed to having it in place by the end of five years.

As well, reciprocal transfer arrangements have been developed to permit free movement of pension credits between union pension plans.

The establishment of a government-administered central pension agency creates an illusion that a solution to an adequate pension at retirement is in place with such a proposal. In fact this does nothing to improve the situation, nor does it even represent portability as I have just described it.

At present a number of facilities exist for recording and maintaining pension benefit credits. These include facilities of trust and insurance companies for holding deferred pension benefits and registered retirement savings plans. When an employee terminates now and is entitled to a deferred, vested benefit, he will receive a statement showing the amount of the benefit and where to apply when he is entitled to receive that benefit. If a central agency was established, and I don’t think it’s a bad idea at all, he would obviously apply to the agency rather than the company. Should such an agency be established, consideration for a national agency would be paramount. Provincial agencies in each jurisdiction would obviously be cumbersome.

There are other problems that come to mind, such as the difficulties in determining the value of vested interest due to the types of plans in existence, particularly defined benefit plans such as final and career average. Who will guarantee this central agency will have enough money to guarantee payments of all benefits until the last annuitant dies?

However, in the interest of being supportive of this important resolution, I would like to make my second amendment to part (b) to read, “the establishment of a central pension agency administered jointly by the Canadian chartered banks and our national trust companies.”

With regard to part (c), as the member himself indicated, this refers to the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation as established under the ERISA program in the United States.

Hon. Mr. Walker: I don’t follow that. How does he have the right to get up?

Mr. McCaffrey: In the interests of time I won’t go into some notes I had made on that, but there are some very fundamental and important legislative differences between the US and Canada, which in my judgement make this type of body unnecessary.

In the US, unfunded liabilities may be amortized over a period of 30 years.

Mr. Acting Speaker: The honourable member’s time has expired.

Hon. Mr. Walker: You know how time flies when you’re having fun.

Mr. McCaffrey: Do I have a minute to wrap up?

Mr. Kerrio: The member has 10 seconds.

Mr. McCaffrey: As I said at the outset, one of the clear problems in the proposer’s comments, and to some extent in mine, is that we can get all wrapped up in the actuarial, detailed and technical aspects of this question when in reality -- and I must compliment the member, if I may, for making no bones about it -- he was no more than two minutes into the introduction of his resolution when he made it clear it was nothing more than an up-front attack on anything smacking of private at the expense of public --

Mr. Acting Speaker: The member’s time has expired.

Mr. McCaffrey: -- which I perceive as an attack on the individual in favour of the state.

Mr. Acting Speaker: Order. The honourable member for London Centre.

Interjections.

Mr. Peterson: Mr. Speaker, I’m very happy to rise and participate in this debate, because in my view it’s a very important one. Let me compliment the two members who preceded me. I think they honestly represent two different points of view which were both well expressed. They were excellent contributions to the debate that’s in front of us, because it is a fundamental question. It’s one that is fraught with ignorance. It’s one of the more complicated questions we face in this country, because it has profound social and financial ramifications for all of us and for our children who come after us.

I am very happy to see this debate initiated by the member for Hamilton East (Mr. Mackenzie). I’m going to support the resolution as a statement of general principle that we do need pension reform. Although I may take issue at the odd detail, fundamentally the resolution is correct. We do need reform. I don’t want to be picky, except --

Mr. Kerrio: He is going to make six amendments. How does that grab you?

Mr. Laughren: Does the member mean he’s going to support the member for Hamilton East?

Mr. Peterson: I’m very fond of the member for Hamilton East. He and I have a great deal in common, as I have noted in the past.

Mr. Laughren: Yes, the heritages.

Mr. Petersen: Let me say I would have preferred to have had this debate after the Haley commission comes down. We’re now a year or so late and we’ll probably be another six months. With any luck it will put some of these great questions in perspective in a cogent way that we can debate; to that extent I think the question is a little bit premature.

I was one of those people who followed with great interest the submissions to the Haley commission. It was interesting to note the very deep divisions. There were roughly two camps that presented reports to the Haley commission, which was involved with many aspects of the pension question and not just the ones we are discussing here today,

There was one group represented, and their views I think were eloquently expressed by the member for Hamilton East, that talked about the needs for retirement income. Those are realities. We have a society today where one out of two or one out of three pensioners, or people over the age of 65, senior citizens, are living below the poverty line, in fact are going backwards. They are the principal victims of the vicious inflation we have in this country. That is a real social tragedy and there is no question about it.

That point of view has been very well represented by a number of groups in front of the Haley commission and it was very well spoken about today by my colleague from Hamilton East.

There is another aspect to this question, and that is the whole financial question. It hasn’t been dealt with. My friend from Armourdale dealt with some of the technical aspects and I think he made an important contribution, but some of the financial aspects of this question have not been dealt with heretofore and they are going to have to be dealt with. It comes down, in a simple sense, in a broad sense, to who is going to pay, to what generation is going to pay for what other generation, and whether we believe as a matter of philosophy in these massive intergenerational transfers of wealth.

We saw governments take on legal commitments in the 1960s, in the great spirit of liberalism, that our children are going to have to honour as some of the great pension plans run into negative cash positions, and in fact for all intents and purposes become bankrupt. That is necessarily going to mean an increase in tax rates. We have seen those accumulated pension funds so violently abused by government in order to finance current deficits, with no provision for creating savings for the future, that it has left this country in a very serious situation.

My authority on this is none other than Grant Reuber, Mr. Speaker, who as you know was chairman of the Ontario Economic Council, vice-president of the Bank of Montreal, vice-president of the University of Western Ontario and who is now Deputy Minister of Finance in Ottawa. He said: “The pension question, the pension debate, the pension crisis is more fundamental and more important to our financial future than any other question facing this nation, including the energy question.” That is how important it is.

I think my friend from Armourdale is quite right: It is fraught with ignorance; there are very few people who understand it. I would respectfully submit that the average person you talk to on the street has no idea what his pension entitlement is and he is unfamiliar with a lot of the terminology and the concepts. That is certainly one of the places we have to start.

I would like to see included in this motion, I say to my friend from Hamilton East, some far tougher provisions for disclosure than those which are there at present. Only when we force pension plans to upgrade the level of information they are giving their beneficiaries are we going to start forcing people into this debate, because most people only start to think about these things when they are approaching retirement age, and by and large that is far too late to get involved in the question.

It has not been alluded to, but we are all quite aware of the changing demographics in this country and the fact that we are progressively becoming older as a nation, the fact that we are going to have fewer workers and more retirees, the fact that we are going to have fewer people contributing to the gross national product and more people trying to live off the products of their wealth in the absence of savings to look after that kind of thing. We are necessarily going to see higher tax rates and we are going to see an economy burdened with transfer payments to the older generation. That is going to start in the 1980s and it is going to become very serious in the 1990s, unless we start making provisions now.

Some of the broad questions are: Who should pay? Does one have an obligation to save up today, with employer contributions as well as his own contributions, to provide for himself? Generally speaking, I think that is the way it has to go. It has been so easy for companies, under some of the pension regulations we have had in this province, to give in on a pension question at union negotiations because it is an obligation that management group is not going to have to face. We have to look far more fundamentally at the question of total compensation bargaining, at how much we are putting away today. I totally agree with the point made by the member for Hamilton East (Mr. Mackenzie), or at least the point implicit in what he was saying, that the employers’ contributions to the employee’s pension fund belongs to the employee. I think there have been far too many companies that have totally abused it and used the pension plan as a form of bondage for the people who have worked for them. That should not longer be the case. I would like to see much tougher provisions, with legal entitlement to the employer contribution to that fund established far more quickly. There are a number of ways to handle that. My friend for Hamilton East has a solution for it.

[5:15]

At the same time, I think we must have some great sensitivity for small businesses, businesses not able to generate pension funds. There are a number of ways to compensate people today. Some companies choose to compensate a person with various profit sharing or bonus types of arrangements depending on performance through which that person is entitled to take all their earnings up front.

Some people, rather than putting it away for later life, choose to buy a boat or a Cadillac or something else. I don’t think those people should necessarily be subsidized later in life because they haven’t provided for themselves. We are today almost developing a system where we punish the savers and reward the consumers; we are rewarding the people who are into over-consumption.

I would argue very strongly that we have an obligation to impress the seriousness of the situation on people and assist them, through devices like -- I think one of the most marvellous things invented in this country -- the registered retirement savings plan which provides for tax deferral and takes money from high income periods into lower income periods so people can provide, to some extant, for their own retirement.

Mr. Laughren: I am sure you contribute to the maximum, too.

Mr. Peterson: Anybody who doesn’t contribute to the maximum is foolish.

Mr. Swart: Or can’t afford it.

Mr. Laughren: Or can’t afford it.

Mr. Peterson: Well frankly you don’t understand the maximum, because the maximums work in very funny ways. All these interjections are interesting. These Pavlovian responses from my friends to the left are predictable.

I am trying to discuss another aspect of the problem. I guess they are not arguing about the resolution on the paper today. Are they arguing for more pensions? What are they arguing for? I have no idea. Are they arguing for a bigger state-run pension fund? I have no idea what they are arguing for. They are talking from several different points of view.

Mr. Warner: Well if we are predictable, you should know.

Mr. Peterson: I want to make a couple of other points I think are important. I am very concerned about the management of public funds in this country.

We are creating two classes of people; those who have insulated themselves from the ravages of inflation through indexing and other types of government devices --

Mr. Kerrio: Right on, the government is partly responsible for that.

Mr. Peterson: -- and those who are not part of any plan and haven’t been assisted to look after their own old age. That is probably the most fundamental injustice I am aware of in society today. Someone equated it to the crew of a sinking ship taking to the lifeboats first. I think that is a fairly good analogy.

I only regret my time is over, because there are many other things I would like to discuss. But let me just say in my final sentence that I think this is a good resolution; I think it is a good start and it speaks very dramatically to the question of necessary reform in this province and in this country. It is a good start and I urge all my colleagues to support it.

Mr. Germa: Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise in support of the resolution presented by the member for Hamilton East on what I consider a very timely subject, but one which of course does not occupy people’s minds for a great deal of their lives. It is very difficult to get a person aged 25 or 30 to become interested in his welfare some distant time down the road; but inevitably, barring unforeseen circumstances, he will come there and start concentrating very earnestly on his situation as he approaches that magic age, called retirement age.

So I think it is timely for us to remind ourselves there is a problem, there are weaknesses in the system. I start from the basic underlying principle that all of the wealth and the benefits and the luxury you and I are enjoying at this moment, Mr. Speaker, are a result of labours in the past by our former population; our mothers, our fathers, our grandfathers and our grandmothers; it is as a result of their labours that you and I are enjoying the present standard of living.

It follows that if we are enjoying an increased standard of living as a result of their labours, consequently their standard of living should also be geared to the increased living standards you and I enjoy, because the two are related. I believe that is what the resolution is speaking to. As our standard of living rises, so the standard of living of our senior citizens should rise by the same proportionate degree.

We are facing a serious problem as our population ages, as the percentage of aged people increases, We are going to have problems in funding these various and myriad pension plans that exist across the province, and in fact across the country today.

Despite the fact there are thousands and thousands of different complex pension plans, only 40 per cent of the work force at this moment, or approximately 40 per cent of the work force, is contributing to private plans. Sixty per cent of the people will never have an opportunity to look after their own welfare, as suggested by the member for Armourdale (Mr. McCaffrey), and I think that is part of the blind eye he is putting on the picture. He doesn’t understand that many people, in fact 60 per cent, never have the opportunity to contribute to a private pension plan and consequently will have to rely on the government sponsored universal plans which are in place.

Mr. McCaffrey: And other forms of assistance, which are also important.

Mr. Germa: The member for Armourdale also shied away from the motion in that it was too simplistic, it was too narrow and was dealing only with three items of concern. The person presenting the motion identifies there are so many problems in the private system pension plans that one would need a 10-page document, a 10-page resolution to bring all of the problems to the attention of this Legislature.

All he did, and he admitted it, was bring to the attention of this Legislature the three problems he saw as paramount in the present system of pensions in Ontario today.

Mr. McCaffrey: I support two of them.

Mr. Germa: It doesn’t exonerate all of the other weaknesses.

Mr. McCaffrey: Fine, we’ve got lots of time to get to those.

Mr. Mackenzie: The people may not.

Mr. Germa: Certainly the member for Armourdale has worked in the pensions field and is very expert and just because we know it is a technical problem we cannot shy away from it, we still have to talk about it. We know it is very complex and technical; we know about the planning and the finance, the administration and the evaluation; and all of those considerations which must go into a properly administered and funded plan; we know all about that.

Despite these great problems we still have to talk about the matter. It is my opinion that a lot of these problems would go away if we had a universal plan in place which would accommodate most of the people’s needs in this country. The private insurers then could fill in with those luxury items for those people who can afford it.

Only if we go to an expansion of the Canada Pension Plan are we really going to solve the problem, because there is no way we can administer, or police, or enforce any regulations in the thousands and thousands of plans which are presently in place.

Of course the governments of the day are such that they don’t want to infringe on the private interests of the insurance companies. Make no mistake about it, that’s where this government is. I think the member for Armourdale expressed it quite bluntly when he said he doesn’t believe the government should be in the business whatsoever, and that the private interests, the private insurers, can administer the thing a whole lot better.

Let me say the money they are administering is not their money, it is money held in trust by them on behalf of the people who participate. That’s the kind of money we are talking about. It is not their dollar, it is my dollar and your dollar. They have no jurisdiction without my permission.

Mr. McCaffrey: Right.

Mr. Germa: I would rather have my government administer my trust fund than have the privateers doing it.

At the present time, with the state of government in Canada as it is, we cannot expect the public plan to grow so we have to talk about the private plans. We have to try and correct the mess it is in right now. Marc Lalonde, when he was Minister of Health in 1973, told us exactly what he saw the Canada Pension Plan to be. I quote: “The CPP was not set up to provide a total retirement income. Rather it was used as the middle tier of a three-tier system -- Old Age Security, Canada Pension Plan and private benefit benefits and annuities. The first two components were geared to ensure adequacy, the third to provide whatever supplementary margin of comfort was desired.”

He was talking about the private firms as providing just for the supplementary margin of comfort, but we see the government plan is not adequate so we have to rely on private plans for fundamental and basic needs.

Regarding the amendments put forward by the member for Armourdale, I have to reject them out of hand. He agrees with the five-year vesting but he wants the person to have attained the age of 40. A member of this Legislature was in the government plan and he has not yet reached the age of 40. He was ripped off twice of OMERS in the first instance when he was a civic employee; he also had service with the province under the public service fund and now he’s in the Ontario Legislature. He lost his credits in OMERS, he lost his credits in the public service fund and here he is starting out again, and he has not yet reached 40.

That man has worked and contributed to funds and has no equity anyplace. Sure they paid him back his contribution at a minimal rate of return, but there’s no guarantee the payback is even going to pay bank interest. That’s a fundamental weakness. It’s the losses of the many that are financing the benefits of the few, That’s not how it should be. When you make an investment you expect to have a return. So the age-40 requirement will still wreak havoc upon those people who have mobility. Maybe they don’t want mobility, but through circumstances they have to give up their contributions in the plan.

The second part of the amendment I reject quite easily, when he wants this central pension agency administered by the private sector. I would rather trust my government, as bad as it is, ahead of trusting the private sector, because their motivations are not in my best interest. They are not motivated to increase the benefits to me but to increase the bottom line profit figure, which is the goal of all privateers.

Mr. Acting Speaker: The honourable member’s time has expired.

Mr. Germa: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Renwick: It’s a good word to end on.

Mr. Eaton: Mr. Speaker, as we can see by the debate so far, the subject of pensions is certainly one that becomes increasingly complicated. To us, as we grow older, it’s one that becomes more meaningful to us. I think it becomes a complex topic when one begins to look into the actuarial basis of our pension plans. It requires a great deal of rational analysis, which I must commend my colleague for Armourdale for presenting so capably.

It also hits on an emotional issue --

Mr. Mackenzie: You are another one of the class of 1926, are you?

Mr. Eaton: It also hits us on an emotional issue, for it involves our basic security. I think it means a lot more than just our security to us; it means a lot to our economy too as we think about the moneys that are invested.

Its real importance increases when others are dependent on us or when we become, for one reason or another, incapable of supporting ourselves and making enough money to provide ourselves with the necessities of life.

[5:30]

Generally, I am quite proud of this province’s treatment of its pensioners. The assistance to senior citizens in their health insurance coverage is an example of the kind of program I support very strongly. We are doing the right thing, as well, in our co-operative efforts with municipal governments and with the private sector in making transportation and participation in social and cultural programs as accessible as possible.

Our retired people have served society by long years of work in one form or another, and by raising families and participating in our community affairs. They deserve the best we can afford to give them. Therefore, I am quite in agreement with the spirit of the resolution before us today. Basically, I support every one of the ideas, but like all good ideas, we have to examine each one in a very careful manner. We have to ask ourselves two things: do we really want to legislate all of this, or would it be more in keeping with the principles and policies under which the people of Ontario expect us to operate if we worked in a co-operative rather than a coercive way with the employers in this province.

Second, we must bear in mind that someone has to pay for every improvement in pension benefits, be they through government or private sector plans. The question is, can we afford them? Can we ask the private sector to foot the bill for increased pension security out of its revenues; might the burden prove too great for it to bear?

I want to repeat the basic point that I accept the resolution of the member for Hamilton East. It is a matter of pure social justice to work as quickly as we can towards the finest possible returns we can have in pensions, but let’s watch that the money we are talking about spending comes from a pot that is going to remain sound on a long-term actuarial basis. Let’s not be guilty of trying to saddle free enterprise with yet another quasi tax burden. I don’t think people will accept that, and personally I can’t blame anyone who feels that way.

For better or worse, it is becoming less and less common for people to spend most of their working lives with one firm. Many of those who choose to work for the large or small employers in the province will have changed jobs several times before they reach retirement, and I think that example was shown by one of the members over there referring to a member who had come in here and switched three or four times. It probably applies to many in jobs like ours.

If accepting this resolution will help people in this sort of situation, I am all for it. By and large, any steps which stimulate economic activity in a general sense will prove more beneficial at this point in time than additional drain on the taxpayers or on the corporate revenues.

It is a big question and one on which we must move slowly and cautiously, albeit with a spirit of concern, generosity and justice. Our objective in considering these pensions is quite simple; to determine what is a reasonable basic level of pension protection that will be required by law and below which no plan can fall.

I am sure all these factors have been carefully examined and weighed by the Ontario Royal Commission on the Status of Pensions. This commission began its work in 1977 and I believe its report to this House is due in the early part of next year.

Obviously, it would be unwise of us to move toward any revisions of the 1965 Pension Benefits Act until we have carefully considered the commission’s findings and recommendations. I am quite confident that the spirit of the commission’s recommendations will be compatible with the resolution we are considering here today.

I know that these problems relate to plant shutdowns and bankruptcies and other forms of discontinuation of pension plans.

As people live longer and as the proportion of our population over age 65 continues to increase, more attention will have to be paid to those in the age brackets who are for one reason or another involved in this. Let us not forget, however, that we already have some very enlightened programs in place, both at the provincial and federal level, which help our seniors to achieve financial security. We have the Canada Pension Plan and the federal old age security pensions. We have the health programs. In Ontario we have the very fine Gains, or guaranteed annual income supplement program, which is of considerable assistance to our senior citizens.

Let us not forget, even though we hear all kinds of reports about the breakdown of the family, a good many of our citizens are quite prepared to help their retired parents and relatives in one way or another.

In preparing the comments for this ballot item I ran across a 1961 report of an Ontario commission on pensions. It was good reading, as I’m sure the current royal commission’s report will be. I’d like to quote a few sentences if I may. I’m really addressing these to the member for Hamilton East and his colleagues; I’m pretty sure he would have this government foot the bill for improved pension benefits and urged increased regulations of pensions upon it.

“There is a tendency for the state measures that were originally directed to the single aim of providing pensions to become involved with other and sometimes irrelevant or even conflicting objectives.” That’s a quote out of that report.

Further, “A state pension authority may prove a convenient administrative tool, along with that of unemployment insurance, for the payment of what is virtually relief, for the prosecution of fiscal policy, for discouraging people from travelling or living abroad, for equalizing income by ways of a means test, for internal or cross subsidies within the plan, especially from the young to the old, or even for inflicting penalties through withdrawal of pension rights.” That’s another quote from that report.

I think these are sobering words. I would conclude these remarks by urging this House to take them very seriously in any debate on pension policies and any conclusions arrived at in regard to pension policies.

Mr. O’Neil: I also am very pleased to be able to speak today on the subject of improving the administration of pension plans in this province. I support in principle the resolution put forth by the member for Hamilton East.

I’m particularly pleased that the main thrust of this resolution is portability of pensions, because despite improvement in private pension plans in recent years lack of portability remains a prime shortcoming.

The difficulty in establishing portability in the private sector arises mainly from the many differences in pension plan design between one employer and the other. Lack of portability is not only a deterrent to the much-needed mobility of labour, it’s also grossly unfair to employees. What is needed is a scheme to enable employees to carry periods of service from employer to employer.

I suppose this fact was brought home to me a number of years ago when my mother-in-law was employed by a local hospital. She was the dietician at that hospital and worked there for approximately 10 years. A food service business came into the hospital. She lost her 10 years of service in the pension and was forced to start a new plan, the rest being returned to her with interest.

I would also like to touch on a matter the member for Hamilton East mentioned briefly but did not expand on. That is coverage for women in our society. Vital pension reforms are needed for the surviving spouse. Our current pension system, by its very nature, effectively discriminates against females because they earn less. It also ensures that a substantial portion of females will spend their retirement years in poverty.

I would like to give members some new statistics on this subject. In 1976, of all participants in private sector plans two thirds were in plans that provided no widows’ pensions; even when both private and public sector plans were considered, less than 60 per cent provided widows’ pensions.

When members consider another basic problem, that pension plans only cover about half of the labour force in Canada statistically living beyond the age of 65, it drastically increases the odds a woman will live in poverty. Even if a woman has worked in the labour force herself she is not going to benefit equally with a man.

A Statistics Canada table showing pensioners of private plans by annual income reveals that females in every income level receive an average pension that is less than a male’s. For example, in the lowest income bracket, less than $1,000 annually, while a male receives an average pension of $412, a female would receive $262. In the income bracket of $5,000 to $6,000, while a man would receive an average pension of $2,514, a female’s pension would be $1,964.

Since women’s earnings in Canada are currently 60 per cent of men’s earnings and the Canada Pension Plan and private plans are based on earnings, women’s pensions are always lower. Women who take time off to raise a family earn fewer pension credits; women who work part-time generally earn no pension credits.

I would also like to say a word on indexing. There is probably no element in our modern society more in need of revision than the current inequities of our pension schemes as they relate to elderly Canadians trying to exist on a rapidly eroding fixed income.

This brings me to the last point I would like to mention, of which indexing is part. If inflation hadn’t hit Canada so dramatically in the 1970s, probably most workers and employees would have been quite satisfied with the benefits provided by their pension plans. The cost of indexing is high. In some cases ad hoc catch-up increases have been made by private companies from time to time, particularly over the last 10 years. Indexing represents an open-ended and expensive commitment.

The challenge to private sector plans is one of making the pension fund moneys work for you. Wise investment of these funds in a well-diversified portfolio would best protect the purchasing power of the pension benefit. Coincidentally, the proper investment of these funds would help stimulate our economy, a point we have stressed in every one of our budget responses for the last four years. That would be a very welcome side effect.

In closing, let me repeat I am sure this debate will serve as the forerunner of the upcoming discussions on the findings and recommendations of the Ontario Royal Commission on the Status of Pensions. Surely there can be no individual in this Legislature who cannot support the reforms, so badly needed in our pension scheme, that will allow our elderly to live their lives in the dignity they so richly deserve.

Mr. Laughren: I heartily commend my colleague from Hamilton East for his initiative in bringing forth this resolution. It is something that has been needed for a long time. I have personally been involved only slightly in the whole pension debate, dealing with the stacking versus the integration of pensions, the member for Hamilton East is dealing with the problem from a much broader perspective.

The thing he is dealing with that I find so crucial is the whole question of both vesting and portability. Some of us can remember that the reason the Canada Pension Plan was set up in the first place was the private sector had not built a system that was portable. Thanks to the public sector we now have a system called the Canada Pension Plan, that has portability, putting aside for a moment the whole question of the old age security program.

If there is one thing central to the mobility of workers in Ontario or any place else, it is that ability to be mobile. As long as there are penalties against workers moving from one place of employment to another, they are not mobile and there is a form of restriction on them which serves the employers’ best interests but not the best interests of working people.

That is why I was appalled at the amendment proposed by the member for Armourdale (Mr. McCaffrey). His amendment changes the vesting provisions to read, “upon attaining the age of 40 and having five years of service with the employer”, I ask you, Mr. Speaker, what has age got to do with the vesting of a pension? How can the member justify any age there? Why 40? What does it mean? What is the purpose of putting the age of 40 in there?

Mr. Mackenzie: To destroy mobility.

Mr. Laughren: Either workers are mobile --

Mr. Speaker: I would remind the honourable member that the amendment to which he refers is not properly before the House. I urge him to deal specifically with the resolution.

[5:45]

Mr. Laughren: I’m very pleased to hear that, Mr. Speaker.

By the way, I regard this whole resolution as a compromise resolution, but that’s typical of my colleague from Hamilton East, he’s very compromising. What he is saying is he’s going to improve the pension system the way it is now in the province of Ontario, and that’s a compromise. He’s allowing it to remain, to a certain extent, the way it is now, whereas in fact if you look at that plethora of pension schemes in this county you really have to question the efficiency of the overall system.

We have old age security, the Canada pension, the supplement, the private pensions, the Gains supplement; how can one possibly say that’s an efficient pension system?

The member for Armourdale and the member for London Centre (Mr. Peterson) both showed their true colours: In one case, the member for London Centre was talking about RRSPs being such a great thing. We know who takes advantage of RRSPs. He expressed surprise when we said we bet he provided or contributed the full amount, the maximum. “Of course,” he says. “Doesn’t everybody?”

Mr. McCaffrey: Hundreds of thousands of Canadian citizens do.

Mr. Laughren: I want to tell you most people can’t possibly afford to make any contribution to a RRSP, let alone the maximum. I understand the members over there don’t understand that, but that’s a fact.

The one thing we have come to accept in this country is pensioners require an income, and it is foolish, downright foolish, to carry on with the existing system. The private sector has not dealt fairly with pensioners. You need only look --

Mr. McCaffrey: The state shouldn’t be in the business.

Mr. Laughren: Look at the life insurance industry and what they do with whole life policies, telling people who buy a whole life policy there’s a saving component for their old age. What a lot of nonsense, because when you look at the returns on that component of whole life policies it is pathetic, it is downright pathetic. That’s what your private sector has done to people who think they’re saving wisely for their old age; it’s simply not there.

I wish somebody would add up the entire administrative costs of the pension schemes in this country now. We would find it was horrendous. If we did away with workmen’s compensation in this county, we would find how horrendous and how incredible the cost would be if the private sector looked after workmen’s compensation all across Canada instead of having a central agency. We can question the way the Workmen’s Compensation Board is run, but as an agency it is absolutely essential that we have it.

There were a number of comments that bothered me a great deal. The member for Armourdale seems to equate freedom with the freedom to manipulate funds or wheel and deal in funds in order to save for retirement. We’re talking, by and large, about people who don’t have those kinds of funds to play with in the first place.

The member for Armourdale worries that if we have too strict vesting rules it will discourage employers from establishing pension funds in the first place. That should not even be negotiable. Workers should be entitled to a pension plan, period.

When the member for Armourdale says if we make the vesting rules too strict we will discourage employers, what he’s really saying is there is no obligation on the part of employers to establish pension funds in the first place.

Mr. McCaffrey: No.

Mr. Laughren: Of course he is, that’s exactly what he’s saying.

The point the member for London Centre made was employees should be able to get their contribution out of a fund when they leave, if there’s termination or if they quit. Perhaps the members need to be reminded that when an employee negotiates a pension fund in any given year --

Mr. Speaker: The honourable member’s time has expired.

Mr. Laughren: -- employers’ contributions to a pension fund are in lieu of wage increases and should be regarded as such.

REST HOMES

Mr. Speaker: The first item to be considered is the resolution standing on the Order Paper in the name of Mr. Blundy. Any member objecting to this question being placed before the House should now rise.

Does the resolution have the concurrence of the House?

Resolution concurred in.

PENSIONS

Mr. Speaker: The second item to be considered by the House is the resolution standing in the name of Mr. Mackenzie. Any member objecting to this question being placed before the House should now rise.

Does the resolution have the concurrence of the House?

Resolution concurred in.

EDUCATION FUNDING

Mr. Speaker: I want to draw to the House’s attention that the petition of the Ontario Federation of Students tabled by the member for Windsor-Riverside (Mr. Cooke) calls for the expenditure of public funds. It is therefore, by standing order 19(f), out of order as a petition to the Legislature. However, as the petition cards are actually addressed by the signers to the Minister of Colleges and Universities (Miss Stephenson) and not to the Legislature, they have been forwarded to her office.

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE

Hon. Mr. Wells: Mr. Speaker, pursuant to standing order 13, I’d like to indicate to the House the business for tomorrow and next week.

Tomorrow, the House will consider in committee of supply the estimates of the Ministry of Revenue; on Monday we will continue in committee of supply considering the estimates of the Ministry of Revenue.

On Tuesday, November 20, we will consider legislation in the afternoon, and in the evening second reading of Bill 160, followed by Bill 156; and then completion of committee of the whole House consideration of Bill 122. Following that we will consider second readings for Bill 146, Bill 147, Bill 173 and Bill 172 in that order.

On Wednesday, November 21, the justice, general government and resources development committees may meet in the morning.

On Thursday, November 22, in the afternoon we will consider private members’ public business. The first item will be ballot item 7 standing in the name of the member for Durham West (Mr. Ashe), followed by ballot item 8 standing in the name of the member for Kitchener (Mr. Breithaupt). In the evening we will resume the adjourned debate on the motion for adoption of the recommendations contained in the seventh report of the select committee on the Ombudsman.

On Friday, November 23, the House will consider in committee of supply the estimates of the Ministry of Revenue.

ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS ON NOTICE PAPER

Hon. Mr. Wells: Mr. Speaker, I’d like to table the answers to questions 339, 342 and 347 standing on the Notice Paper.

MISSISSAUGA TRAIN FIRE

Mr. Nixon: Mr. Speaker, I wonder if the members would consent to hear from the Minister of the Environment to see what he is doing in Mississauga and when he is going to open the QEW.

Mr. Speaker: If there are no objections and the Minister of the Environment is willing we’ll hear him.

Hon. Mr. Parrott: Mr. Speaker, there are some developments I can report on.

The condition in the tank at this minute is very stable. The patch that has been placed on the car does not completely hold the vapour from escaping, but the people have been able to hook up a vacuum pump to a vacuum car and draw off the vapour in the car. At the moment, therefore, there is very little, if any, vapour escaping into the atmosphere. It is being drawn off by a vacuum pump, neutralized and put into a vacuum car.

The situation, as I understand it, is that the remaining liquid in the car, which must be drained off, is covered with a layer of ice, perhaps six to 12 inches thick. The intent is to draw off that liquid because it must be drawn off before the car is moved. One of the interesting factors is if liquid chlorine becomes a gas it occupies 700 times the volume. That means there would be a great deal of gaseous emission if it became a gas.

They are now setting up facilities and I think by this evening will be ready to start the operation of taking the liquid off. The weather forecast indicates the winds will be from the north-northwest, which means if by the remotest chance something went wrong the emission would be blown over the area where people are evacuated. It is hoped those wind conditions will prevail and the liquid will be taken off as soon as possible.

No expert can tell us at this time the exact amount of liquid in the car or the rate at which it can be taken off; that will proceed with as much speed as is humanly possible. I think, without exception, every expert at the scene agrees the method we are now proceeding with is the one of choice and the only one that makes sense. I mean not only my own staff of course, but the Ministry of Health, the Ministry of Labour, occupational safety branch, the senior officials of the Canadian Transport Commission, the people from Chlorate, the chlorine institute, who have been technically handling the operation, as well as CP officials. Everyone, without exception, has agreed this method is the one of choice and the one we should proceed with.

With any good fortune that liquid will be removed in the very near future; and then, of course, we will be able to remove the car. With that the tremendous potential of that disaster will have been eliminated.

The House recessed at 5:57 p.m.