Journal des débats 1982-sept-28 | Assemblée législative de l'Ontario

Mr. Speaker: Before getting along with the routine proceedings, I would like to inform the House about a ruling as a result of the matter which was raised earlier.

It has been pointed out to the House on many occasions that it is not part of the Speaker's responsibility to investigate matters of privilege and report back to this House. However, in the matter raised by the member for Huron-Middlesex (Mr. Riddell) on September 23, because the Hansard editor of debates is a senior employee of the Office of the Assembly, whose department falls under my jurisdiction, I feel it is incumbent upon me to advise the House of the circumstances which gave rise to the honourable member's point of privilege.

Mr. Brannan recently wrote an article on the production of Hansard for the Canadian Parliamentary Review. He was subsequently contacted by a representative of the press and he gave a brief telephone interview on his article. The reporter wrote an article which was carried in the Globe and Mail. The article was subsequently reproduced in the government publication referred to by the member.

I have reviewed the various articles, including the portion of the government publication purporting to quote Mr. Peter Brannan. Mr. Brannan has assured me unequivocally that he did not make the comments referred to by the honourable member in his point of privilege.

STATEMENT BY THE MINISTRY

JOB CREATION

Hon. Mr. Walker: Mr. Speaker, I want to bring members up to date on current developments involving three major companies which have significant influence on Ontario's economic recovery.

This morning I spoke with the senior executives of International Harvester and General Motors in connection with important announcements each has made during the past 24 hours.

As members are aware, a third firm, Massey- Ferguson, disclosed this morning it has completed a restructuring of its finances and operations as the first positive step towards the company's ultimate recovery and long-term growth.

Second, Mr. Speaker, as mentioned more fully in answer to a question raised by the member for Chatham-Kent (Mr. Watson) quite spontaneously yesterday, International Harvester has announced that it will maintain its Chatham operations. This is good news for Ontario and ensures the survival of 1,000 jobs. International Harvester's decision flows from a program of product rationalization being undertaken by the parent United States company. This program will increase the company's production mandate for North America and the export potential for Ontario.

This is also good news, and supports a major economic priority that I have set for our province, and that is to double our total exports to $60 billion by 1987.

Third, with respect to the announcement by General Motors, I am sure all members of this House join me in commending the people responsible for their efforts in securing this important production contract. Particularly I would mention the company's London management team, closely related to a riding with which I am connected, as well as the federal government, specifically the Honourable Ed Lumley.

It will see the creation of light-armoured amphibious vehicles. It will be a rare development in this country and in North America.

There are three aspects of the General Motors announcement that I would like to elaborate on. The first concerns jobs. It has been reported that more than 600 jobs will be saved. There are some 400 persons now on layoff so the numbers work out well. In fact, the employment creation consequences of the General Motors decision will be much more substantial for Ontario. We project that the spinoff effect in the service sector will, over the life of the contract and assuming all options are exercised, mean an additional 1,200 jobs in southwestern Ontario and other parts of the province. Indeed, it may even approach a total of 2,000 jobs.

Second, the contract will make a significant technological contribution. General Motors' management told me this morning the London plant has received the second contract worth $26 million for research and development to design variants of their original equipment. I am also advised that an engineering team will be formed during the next several weeks to begin this effort. In fact, by the end of the year it is anticipated that 200, mostly salaried people, will be brought on stream in the engineering aspect alone.

Finally, with respect to the capital plans, the General Motors plant in London will expand office facilities and introduce test equipment directly associated with the production and development contracts.

These three corporate developments -- unfolding coincidentally back to back in a matter of hours -- underscore rather dramatically that tough decisions are being taken, that productive commitments are at hand and that confidence in Ontario is not just a state of mind but a point of fact. We still, of course, have some distance to travel towards satisfactory economic recovery. But within the last 24 hours an encouraging beginning has been made on these three major fronts.

2:10 p.m.

ORAL QUESTIONS

WELFARE PAYMENTS

Mr. Conway: Mr. Speaker, my first question today will be to the Minister of Community and Social Services. The minister will be aware that today, for the second time in seven days, there has appeared in the public press a report that there has been prepared within his ministry what today's Globe and Mail calls a "strongly worded report" concerning the inadequate levels of welfare assistance provided in this province. A week ago Michele Landsberg in the Toronto Star went further than the Globe article today and named something called a confidential report to cabinet on selected income assistance initiatives.

Both these press reports identify a recently completed internal document which apparently assesses very critically the inadequate welfare assistance rates that are being afforded in this province at this time. Can the minister confirm or deny the existence of that report? If it does exist, can he comment upon the observations or conclusions, particularly as reported by direct quote in recent press accounts, most notably in the Globe and Mail this morning?

Hon. Mr. Drea: First of all, Mr. Speaker, the honourable member is talking about two different things. We will talk about today's so-called document first. No such document was ever tabled to the minister or to cabinet. There was a document, which is not very strongly worded and that is why it never got to the minister, which some people in the research branch did some informal work on back in May and June.

Mr. T. P. Reid: That means they did not get paid for it.

Hon. Mr. Drea: No, no.

Mr. Speaker: Never mind the interjections.

Hon. Mr. Drea: I told the member it was a very wishy-washy document. Members have all read it, sure.

Mr. T. P. Reid: They must have written your answers too.

Hon. Mr. Drea: No, the person who compiled it is not with us any more. The person who compiled the stuff Ms. Landsberg had is not with us any more, because all the things that were in Ms. Landsberg's article were rejected by this minister.

Mr. Wrye: The people who prepared the material quit in disgust is what really happened.

Hon. Mr. Drea: No, I do not think that is an accurate description.

I believe the tenor of the honourable member's question, now that we got rid of the reports and so on, is are we taking an internal look at social assistance in the province'? Yes, we are taking an internal look at social assistance in the province and have been for many months.

One of the reasons that document was so faulty is it did not, in any way, recognize the new economic facts. Unless there is a federal decision, probably commencing next month and accelerating rapidly thereafter, a great many of the 474,000 unemployed in Ontario will be running out of unemployment insurance benefits. Until now they have not been in any way, shape or form connected with social assistance, as the member will recall from my speech to the Association of Municipalities of Ontario.

Even if the federal government does extend the unemployment insurance benefits in particular areas -- I am talking about very massively hit areas such as Sudbury and some of the other mining communities -- the numbers coming off unemployment insurance benefits will indeed be significant. They have been coming off at the rate of about two or three per cent a month, as reflected in the growth of the general welfare assistance case load.

As members will recall, last year we introduced significant improvements in social assistance dealing with long-term cases, particularly the permanently unemployable whom we raised up in two steps to the full disabled rate. For widows between 60 and 64, we took care of the entire complement in the province who were in need of assistance.

We had two rate increases in 1981 for family benefits recipients. In addition, we met many of the shelter costs of last winter for those on general welfare assistance. Indeed, we also assisted the municipalities because we removed the administration costs from part of that shelter program, a move that was very gratefully received by the municipalities.

I pointed out yesterday that I was looking at a number of things -- at the rates, at the impact of the continuing recession on the case load the municipalities will have to bear, at the continued high inflation and how it affects long-term cases who have little or no defence against it.

I am also looking at particular assistance for the most vulnerable part of the community on an ongoing basis, which are the senior citizens.

In addition, as I said yesterday -- I believe it was to the critic of the member's party -- I am also looking at particular winter initiatives for the transients, for those who are migrating in hopes of obtaining employment. I am looking at various types of shelter programs. Indeed, we are looking at an entire package which will treat not merely social assistance but the impact of the continuing recession on social assistance.

Mr. Conway: So the report spoken of this morning, the so-called "strongly worded report" that went to cabinet, is not true. There was no such report and it never went to cabinet.

Hon. Mr. Drea: I will try again to clarify that. Mr. Speaker, there was no such report to cabinet. There was no such report to the minister --

Mr. Speaker: Order. The member has one supplementary, please.

Mr. Conway: I want to be very clear about this because we were treated a week ago to a fairly strongly-worded, colourful response from the minister to the member for Scarborough West (Mr. R. F. Johnston), when he drew to the House's attention the August study done by the Social Planning Council of Metropolitan Toronto, a body which the minister described as an "affirmative action program for underachieving lefties." It was very colourful. Now we have two reports, both of which indicate there is a strong amount of corroborative evidence from within the ministry itself to indicate the minister is quite wrong --

Mr. Speaker: I am waiting patiently for the supplementary question.

Mr. Conway: -- in suggesting that the report of the Social Planning Council of Metropolitan Toronto is bunk and, in fact, the problems are serious. Where is the minister --

Mr. Speaker: Order. I would have to caution the member that he has a supplementary. This is not a time for making a speech.

Ms. Copps: Tell the minister.

Mr. Speaker: Order. Read the standing orders; they read quite clearly. Supplementary, please.

Mr. Conway: Mr. Speaker, as an even-handed, judicious man you would, of course, not want us to get the impression that very elaborate and lengthy answers are going to be allowed the government when more expansive questions are not going to be allowed the opposition.

I want to know from the minister specifically when he intends to bring forward initiatives to deal with the critical situation identified in the press and in other reports for a winter that in many parts of this province is but days away? Can he indicate what specific initiatives he will be entertaining for the House's attention in the very next little while so these tens of thousands of people awaiting some assistance will get some indication? It may be that one of the people who authored this report is no longer with him but the tens of thousands of needy welfare recipients in the province are and will be in increasing numbers.

Hon. Mr. Drea: Mr. Speaker, I will come to that in a moment. Before that I want to clear up one little thing.

The report of the social planning council was based upon cooking the books. They have admitted that. They admitted that on the radio, so let us get rid of that as one of the member's corroborative things.

Mr. Speaker: Now to the question, please.

2:20 p.m.

Hon. Mr. Drea: It dealt purely with rate increases, by the way, nothing we are particularly talking about in substance today. The honourable member has asked me when I intend to do things and what I intend. I went through the things I am looking at the first time and I think any reasonable person could read between the lines. Also the other day I said "before winter." This minister is abundantly aware when winter commences north of Toronto.

Mr. R. F. Johnston: Mr. Speaker, because both reports have been mentioned, I wonder if I can allude to both.

Mr. Speaker: I would rather hear a question.

Mr. R. F. Johnston: I will be alluding to them in the question. Is the minister saying this cabinet submission Michele Landsberg quoted from was never accepted by his ministry? That is one point of clarification.

Will the minister table the second, wishy-washy, strongly worded nonreport so we can see it? Will he not agree he has known since early in the summer that the number of people who are going to he exhaustees from Unemployment Insurance Commission benefits was not going to be four per cent but closer to eight or 12 per cent? This is what John Stapleton in his ministry, who is probably now going to lose his job, has told me. Will the minister not agree he has been sitting on this information and showing a total insensitivity to the issue by knowing when winter falls in December north of Toronto?

Hon. Mr. Drea: Mr. Speaker, as usual the member is confused. I was very specific as to the reports I talked about. The member for Renfrew North raised the report that was in the newspaper this morning. It supposedly went to cabinet. It did not and it did not come to the minister

He also referred to the social planning council report. The member's friend took care of that. There is no question that almost a year ago the report referred to a week ago in the Toronto Star did go to cabinet, but the remarks that were in it were repudiated, not accepted by the minister. It is not part of our current program.

Mr. McClellan: How did it get to cabinet, just slip by?

Mr. R. F. Johnston: Did you take it to cabinet?

Hon. Mr. Drea: It got to cabinet on the basis of putting forward pros and cons and a number of other things. The minister, in order to give a rather complete picture of a rather innovative approach to social assistance, one indeed that has been accepted by all the councils it has been put before --

Mr. R. F. Johnston: Oh, Frank.

Hon. Mr. Drea: Oh yes, I know he had trouble in Peterborough. Even his own friends had to vote for it despite some instructions. That report went to cabinet more than a year ago. The parts referred to in the article are not in the present or future planning of the ministry. Now we have settled that, does that make that one abundantly clear?

In terms of a 12 per cent increase, I have looked --

Mr. McClellan: Can the Minister of Health (Mr. Grossman) tell me, is this contagious?

Hon. Mr. Drea: The member better hope that I am contagious.

Mr. Speaker: Never mind the interjections please.

Hon. Mr. Drea: For the sake of the member's party, he better hope I am contagious because he is going nowhere.

We have factored in the impact of people running out of unemployment insurance, or the new category in social assistance which is employable people who simply cannot find employment because there is none there.

As I pointed out in answer to the member for Renfrew North, that has been coming in at a rate of two to three per cent. There are some arguments that, depending on how the federal government reacts to the extension of UIC benefits and in what areas, the new impact can come from an additional one or two per cent a month, which is very significant, up to five per cent. If the federal government were to bail out completely, which I do not believe is possible, it might go as high as some of the figures that have been suggested to the honourable member.

One last thing: I was the one who brought this to the attention of AMO and other people in the public forums so the member should not accuse me of sitting on it. If he does not like the approach I take, that is fine, but nobody in this province discussed the impact of UIC benefits running out until I did.

Mr. Boudria: Mr. Speaker, I also wish to speak to the so-called nonreport of today, which the minister says he has not yet seen. He has undoubtedly seen the newspaper report, however, and the statement in the report as follows: "Participation is to be voluntary, but all recipients will be expected to participate."

As it relates to single mothers who are to be transferred to the municipality under the so- called nontransfer to the municipality program, is this the position of the minister or the ministry'? If it is, does that not contradict the statements the minister made on the steps of the Legislature when he and I addressed the sole support mothers earlier this summer'?

Hon. Mr. Drea: The member is just a bit confused. I just said that document went to cabinet. Let us make no mistake about that and come back tomorrow to say I misled you. The document the member for Prescott-Russell refers to went to cabinet some time in 1981, I believe.

The minister did not accept some of the suggestions in that document and neither did cabinet. That is what I said two or three minutes ago to the member for Scarborough West. The proposals and the integration program we have are exactly as tabled by the region of Peel, the municipality of Peterborough, the county of Lanark, the county of Dufferin -- all of which accepted it. Metropolitan Toronto accepted it in principle on an ancillary program. A number of others are just waiting for full information. It is exactly as I described it on the steps of the Legislature.

Mr. Conway: Your sunglasses may be on, Frank, but your pants are slipping.

URBAN TRANSPORTATION DEVELOPMENT CORP.

Mr. Conway: Mr. Speaker, my question is to the Minister of Transportation and Communications. I am sure that, like the rest of us, the minister reads nightly that hymn of self-praise written and read by the Premier (Mr. Davis) himself a week ago concerning the restraint program. I refer particularly to that part of it where the Premier says, with more than a hint of self-congratulation: "The record of this government on restraint is a sound one;" and, "The extent to which this government in recent months has tightened the screws upon itself to make this even more a reality."

Mindful of the Premier's injunction, I want to discuss -- interrogatively, of course -- the recent activities of the $100,000-a-year man on Amherst Island in Lake Ontario near Kingston, more particularly near Bath. Mindful of what the Premier has said about restraint, what does the Minister of Transportation and Communications think about the fact that some eight or nine months ago Mr. Kirk Foley -- sometime friend and sometime candidate for the Conservative nomination in Scarborough -- apparently spent $120,000 prepaying a 20-year lease on a private yacht club then being built near the village of Bath, not far from the great and historic city of Kingston?

What does the Minister of Transportation and Communications think about that initiative of Mr. Kirk Foley in that it involved expenditure of $120,000? Second, when did he find out about it? Are we to believe that four or five months after Mr. Foley made the commitment, he sat down and thought, "Maybe I should write or phone Jim in Toronto"?

2:30 p.m.

Hon. Mr. Snow: Mr. Speaker, first of all, the member said so many nice things the day I was in his riding I was not really expecting this from him but from the gentlemen behind him -- and I am using that word very loosely.

First of all, I want to make it clear that the Urban Transportation Development Corp. did not invest in a yacht club. The arrangement that UTDC made with the private entrepreneurs, who also happen to own the sailing facilities --

Mr. Breithaupt: It's called a yacht club.

Mr. Cassidy: Which sailing facility does the minister belong to?

Hon. Mr. Snow: The decision to enter into this arrangement with the private enterprise interests that were developing this facility was made and approved by the board of directors of UTDC based on a very detailed report put forward to them. It was not a deal made by Mr. Foley or anyone else; it was made by the corporation and approved by the board of directors.

I was notified of the arrangement by way of a letter on May 20, 1982, which brought me up to date on what the pros and cons were and on the decision that was made to enter into this contract rather than to build a cafeteria and training facilities at the research site itself.

I wish to table a copy of the letter Mr. Foley wrote to me on May 20. Attached to it is a copy of the background documents that went into the decision to enter into this arrangement.

Mr. Conway: I appreciate the minister's tabling of that material. We have already had a chance to look at it.

I want to ask the minister a supplementary question in view of the Premier's injunction that now is a time of restraint and in view of the fact that for these past months this government, of which the minister is so prominently a member, has been working endlessly and well into the night to find ways and means of saving money.

Also, I might mention that about 20 miles east of the village of Bath there is one of the world's great sailing facilities, namely, the harbour built for the 1976 Olympics, on which $120,000 of public moneys was expended.

I will not bore members with the fact that much of the accommodation is some kind of an exclusive pad. A third of the space, according to the press report, is some kind of a jazzy pad for Foley and his buddies.

Does the minister not think that he and his friend the Premier, in the name of restraint and in the public interest, might undertake immediately to extricate themselves from this shameless expenditure? It sets such a wretched example to the thousands of welfare recipients who cannot extract an ounce of sympathy, much less money, from his colleague the Minister of Community and Social Services (Mr. Drea).

Hon. Mr. Snow: Obviously I am not getting through to the honourable gentleman. As I stated in my previous answer, the facilities that UTDC have contracted for are dining room services and accommodation. The arrangement has nothing to do with yachting, with boats or with the Centennial Yacht Club, which the member says may have been available and which I have visited as well. If the member has not taken advantage of visiting the Kingston facility, I would urge him to do so.

Mr. Roy: Can we sleep and eat in Kingston?

Hon. Mr. Davis: Have you ever been to see it, Sean?

Mr. Speaker: Order.

Hon. Mr. Snow: As members know, included in the three main contracts the corporation now has with Vancouver, Detroit and Scarborough is the training of operators and maintenance personnel for this system. As part of that, UTDC has to supply accommodation, meals and so on for these trainees when they come from British Columbia or Detroit.

Mr. Roy: They can't stay in Kingston?

Hon. Mr. Snow: The facility is about 20 to 25 miles outside Kingston and away from any accommodation.

Interjections.

Hon. Mr. Snow: If the members opposite think it would be wise for people to have to travel that distance for lunch each day, I do not think it would be. The alternative was to build cafeteria facilities at the centre, not only for the employees of the centre and for visitors but also for the trainees.

To my mind, the financial calculations prove without a doubt that the arrangement entered into was by far the most economic and frugal arrangement that could have been made.

Mr. Foulds: Mr. Speaker, can the minister tell us who makes the policy when it comes to expenditure of public funds with regard to the UTDC, the minister or Mr. Foley?

Hon. Mr. Snow: First of all, Mr. Speaker, I want to clarify one thing. In my terminology, I would not refer to the funds being spent in this case as public funds. The UTDC is a public company, owned by the province of Ontario, but the funds being provided to pay these expenses are part of contracts being paid for by the customers of UTDC.

Mr. Cunningham: Mr. Speaker, given the litany of other questionable financial activities in this operation, such as the fleet of 30 luxury cars and the purchase of $1 million worth of homes in British Columbia which now probably are worth $650,000, as well as this yacht club arrangement, does the minister not feel the imposition of some financial guidelines on Mr. Foley is long overdue to trim his sails a bit?

Hon. Mr. Snow: No, Mr. Speaker. I have the fullest of confidence in Mr. Foley, in Mr. Rowzee, the chairman of the board of directors, and in all the members of the board of UTDC. I am kept informed of the activities and accomplishments that this corporation has made, is making and will continue to make. I feel that Mr. Foley, his fellow employees and the board of directors of the UTDC should be congratulated by every member of this House for the work they have done, the sales they have made and the exports they have created for this country.

HYDRO RATES

Mr. Foulds: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Minister of Energy. Given the government's decision to control public sector wages, I wonder whether the government has an equal commitment to the control of public sector prices.

In particular, since Ontario Hydro has the sole right to set its own rates and can ignore the recommendations of the Ontario Energy Board, which it did last year, and since regulated prices such as energy costs are one of the major causes of the current inflationary spiral, can the minister assure this House that any Hydro increase proposed for 1982 will be referred to the Inflation Restraint Board?

Hon. Mr. Welch: Mr. Speaker, the honourable member should understand that the 1982 rates are applicable now. I am sure he meant the 1983 rates.

The proposal by Ontario Hydro for its 1983 rates was referred to the minister some months ago. The minister, according to the legislation, referred it to the Ontario Energy Board. There have been very extensive public hearings with respect to that proposal, and the board has reported. Indeed, if the member has had an opportunity to read its report, he will know that the board, acting in a very responsible way, had already drawn attention to the economic situation during the course of its decision. There is no question that this fact influenced it in ultimately coming forward with its recommendations following those extensive public hearings, and Hydro now has the advantage of those sessions. As a result of those hearings, the member will remember that the Ontario Energy Board suggested a reduction of about five per cent in the proposed average rate which Hydro itself had suggested it needed.

2:40 p.m.

The member should keep in mind that in my letter of referral to the Ontario Energy Board I was anxious that they develop the lowest possible rate consistent with a sound financial approach to the whole matter. Now we have that. We have the reference to the economic situation. We have a reduction of five per cent as a result of those hearings. Subsequently, on the basis of the legislation that has been introduced into this House, it will be expected that Hydro will apply wage restraint to the compensation factor as well. The whole question of the compensation package of Hydro is covered by the current legislation we are now debating in the House.

Mr. Foulds: As the minister knows, one of the major reasons for the Ontario Hydro's application for increased rates -- and it will continue to be a major reason for applications for even higher increases -- is the enormous borrowing that Hydro engages in.

Is the minister aware that Ontario Hydro borrowed $2.3 billion this year alone, in addition to the $14 billion it had already borrowed by the end of 1981? Since the interest charges on this borrowing must be paid for by Ontario Hydro's customers, will the minister now agree to the following simple, two-point program: One, freeze Hydro rates; and two, have a full public inquiry into Hydro's capital spending, expansion program and the interest rate charges on that capital program?

Hon. Mr. Welch: If I can answer the second part of the supplementary first, there is no question but that the Hydro board itself is reviewing all of its capital program as part of an overall approach to respond not only to the legislation but also to the spirit of the whole concept of restraint. The Hydro board is examining all of its capital program along those lines.

Second, I think the member will have to recognize that we do have the benefit of a very thorough public review of the revenue requirements of Hydro as examined by the Ontario Energy Board in the context of restraint.

To suggest that one would work from the rate downwards rather than from strict revenue requirements upwards, applying the wage restraint program, is to ignore the fact that if Hydro is denied what is considered to be its reasonable revenue requirements, where else will the money come from to accommodate some artificial price than by increased borrowing and therefore an increased deficit, which then will work in quite a negative way to this whole concept of restraint?

I think this is being approached in a very positive way by determining what the revenue requirements will be.

I do not know why the member is waving at me, whether he wants more of an explanation, but certainly this is a very important question.

The Ontario Energy Board, in the context of the economic situation of today, considered the Hydro request and recommended five per cent below the average which Hydro itself had asked for, and the Hydro board will now be expected to apply the compensation package of the inflation restraint program.

Mr. Kerrio: Mr. Speaker, Ontario Hydro is answerable to no one because of its structure, not to the people of Ontario, not even to the government of Ontario, let alone the Premier or the minister himself. Although it supposedly was set up that way to remove it from the political arena, it was very convenient for the then Treasurer, Darcy McKeough, to take back their funding and put Ontario Hydro in its place.

In view of the fact that the Ontario Energy Board cannot even look into Hydro's expansion -- that is how far they are removed from any examination -- why is the minister not now willing to do the right thing and hold the rates down in just the way he is doing it to the people of Ontario? Why does he not show some leadership over there'?

Hon. Mr. Welch: Mr. Speaker, the honourable member, as Energy critic, understands the law passed by the Legislature in establishment of responsibility of Ontario Hydro. If he were to review the history of his own party, I do not read anywhere where it has ever been argued, as part of the official program of the Ontario Liberal Party, that Ontario Hydro should be part of any particular department or ministry of government. The party has always respected the nonpolitical intervention, and I ask him to read the record on that subject. It is there. No one can change it. The law is quite clear as to who has the ultimate responsibility of setting the rates.

I invite the member to compare the electrical rates in this jurisdiction with those in many other jurisdictions, both in Canada and the United States. I invite him to read, if he has not done so already, the Ontario Energy Board's report with respect to what that board, after very extensive public hearings, felt the revenue requirements of Hydro were. I also remind him that the compensation restraint package in the current legislation applies to Hydro as well.

Mr. Foulds: Does the Minister of Energy consider it part of Ontario Hydro's cautiousness and attitude towards restraint that last week, while the Premier was announcing the program of control on public sector wages, Hydro went out to borrow, in one week alone, $450 million? Does he realize that if only half that amount were put into low-interest loans to develop conservation programs for people in this province to retrofit their homes and get off oil, he could create 10,000 jobs? Is that not the way that money and capital should be spent in this province, instead of on an overexpansion of capital projects in Hydro that we do not need because of a declining rate of consumption?

Hon. Mr. Welch: I repeat that the Ontario Hydro board and its management are currently conducting a very extensive review of what its capital requirements are going to be. I understand, in so far as borrowing is concerned, that it is within the guidelines it established as to what the requirements would be.

It is very interesting to hear the member's observations about conservation. The member from Windsor, in his contribution to the current legislation, did make some reference to the employment implications and what could be accomplished through conservation, making it quite clear that he does not understand the residential energy assistance program already under the jurisdiction of Hydro and the conservation leadership which Hydro is giving.

We should be quite clear here that this public utility enjoys a very splendid reputation and is very conscious of its responsibility to contribute to the overall restraint program, and I am quite satisfied it will respond to it.

WAGE AND PRICE RESTRAINT PROGRAM

Mr. Foulds: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Treasurer about the wage control program in Bill 179. Would the Treasurer care to explain how his program of suppression and confiscation of wages of those workers who have signed two-year agreements will contribute to the wellbeing of Suneela Sikand? Miss Sikand is an inquiries clerk in the Ministry of Transportation and Communications. She is a member of the Ontario Public Service Employees' Union, which had already negotiated an increase for her of 11 per cent starting next January.

Why is the government imposing a cutback of six per cent on her wages, which is a surcharge of $1,080, or the equivalent of an increase in provincial taxes of about 83 per cent? The government would not have the guts to introduce a tax increase of 83 per cent on anybody in this province, let alone a clerical worker. Why does the Treasurer do it through the back door on this group of workers and on this woman in particular?

[Interruption].

Mr. Speaker: Order. I must caution our visitors in the public galleries not to take part in any demonstration; otherwise, I shall have to clear the galleries.

Hon. F. S. Miller: Mr. Speaker, there are a number of two-year contracts that are caught in the control year. The honourable member knows that. At the same time, using his traditional route of choosing a specific example, he will very carefully select it. I wonder, however, whether he really looked into the effects of the program in that particular case. I do not know what the salary level is for that person. If it is less than $20,000, at present she will certainly receive at least five per cent and possibly as much as 7.5 or eight per cent under the program.

Mr. Foulds: You just cut her back by six per cent.

2:50 p.m.

Hon. F. S. Miller: Just a second now. The member made the assumption in his question that it was a total rollback of six per cent, did he not? He made the assumption of six per cent. I am only asking him whether he assumed it. Let me deal with his assumption then.

I suggest to him that if the salary of that person is less than $20,000, his assumption is likely incorrect. If the salary is less than $15,000 a year, it is certainly incorrect.

Mr. Foulds: It is $18,000.

Hon. F. S. Miller: All right. The fact remains --

Mr. Cooke: You are still increasing the taxes; so stop being silly.

Hon. F. S. Miller: I am not being silly. I encourage the member to go out and listen to a lot of people. I have listened to a lot of civil servants in the last little while on phone-in shows. I have to tell him, I have not heard more than one so far who has said the program is not fair from his point of view. That is an important thing to remember. In Hamilton this morning, at least two groups phoned in to say they believed the program was fair, and they were in that program.

Mr. Philip: Why don't you talk to the people in the galleries? They'll tell you how fair it is.

Hon. F. S. Miller: I do not expect total acceptance. I suggest the unemployment in the province is not fair either, and we are trying our very best at present to make sure the dice are not all against one group in society.

Mr. Foulds: It happens to affect 17,000 workers with signed contracts which the Treasurer is rolling back. They happen to be the clerical workers and the office categories, which are traditionally the two lowest-paid categories in the Ontario public service.

The Treasurer mentioned unemployment. All right, let me give him another case. Does he remember the Premier (Mr. Davis) saying last Tuesday, "The measure of job security afforded those who work in the public sector must be viewed as somewhat inequitable when many taxpayers are facing reduced work hours, lower or no salary increases or total loss of income through layoffs"?

Can the Treasurer tell me how holding back the wages of Maggie Kerkhoff, a Canadian Union of Public Employees day care worker in Ottawa, will help her husband? He has been unemployed for more than a year and has no income. How will cutting back his wife's wages on the grounds that she has job security help that family in any way whatsoever?

Hon. F. S. Miller: In the perverted logic of the New Democratic Party, an increase is a cutback. I have to say that no one is cut back under our program.

Mr. Foulds: You cut back the increase they negotiated.

Hon. F. S. Miller: The member should use his words carefully. He has been a teacher at some time in his life, has he not? He said "cut back."

Mr. Foulds: You have been a hell of a Treasurer, let me tell you that.

Mr. Cassidy: It's the contract you made, and you broke it.

Mr. Laughren: You reneged on a deal.

Mr. Speaker: Order. I will have to ask the Treasurer to address his remarks to the specific question and to please ignore the interjections.

Hon. F. S. Miller: The fact that merit increases are also permitted is something no one talks about much, is it? Merit increases are permitted as well. A lot of people in society are in groups that do not have such a thing as a merit increase rolled into their contracts. They think of a five per cent increase as being five per cent and not seven, nine, 11 or 13 per cent at a maximum level. I think we have tried to be very fair in this system.

As I have said before, there are a lot of people out there who would trade their present state for the state of many of our own employees.

To deal directly with the question the member asked me, what am I doing for her husband? If our program does nothing for the unemployed in this province, then of course it is not a success. But the member missed the total point. We never claimed a wage restraint program was the total package. We have asked over and over again, and we are continuing to ask, for an employment-creating package as well. We have said we will be part of that package. We know anything that cuts the rate of inflation and cuts the interest rate creates jobs in Ontario.

Mr. Wrye: Mr. Speaker, in his first answer the Treasurer alluded to the fact that those employees who are earning less than $20,000 could get somewhat more than five per cent.

Since the members of his Tory caucus told him clearly in the caucus meeting that they wanted notching of the program in the drafting of this legislation, let me ask the Treasurer why the notching, even if it is given, is only up to about 6 2/3 per cent at $15,000 income? In drafting this legislation, why did the Treasurer not mandate some notching rather than leaving it simply as a discretion that may or may not be followed? Why did he not give a little bit of equity to those who are truly in need?

Hon. F. S. Miller: Mr. Speaker, the very phrasing of the honourable member's question implied one thing: he would rather be in our caucus than his. He obviously has good relationships with our caucus, which is not surprising, because emotionally he is a Conservative.

The fact is, unlike the Liberals in Ottawa, whom I know he is not one of, at least we recognize that the people at the lower end of the scale should not be given a flat percentage not subject to some discretion. We do have a platform or a floor of $750 and we have the discretion up to $1,000. That was done with a great deal of thought to allow some more flexibility at the lower end of the income scale.

Mr. Foulds: Will the Treasurer admit that this is not an inflation-fighting program but a wage restraint program on the public sector because he cannot meet his deficit any other way? Will he admit that he does not have the power or the courage to raise taxes by a surcharge on those most able to pay -- say, those earning more than $50,000 or $55,000 a year -- and that by putting a surcharge on workers in the public sector he has met that objective?

Does he know, for example, that by rolling back the agreement that his government entered into involving this particular worker, he is increasing the Kerkhoff family's costs by $1,020 in real terms? That is more than Mrs. Kerkhoff will pay for all of her provincial income tax. It is equivalent to an increase of 127.5 per cent in her income tax. If the Treasurer wants to contain his deficit and raise taxes, why does he not do it in an equitable manner?

Hon. F. S. Miller: We did.

KOZAK TREATMENT PROGRAM

Mr. Ruprecht: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Minister of Health. The minister is no doubt aware that Pavel Kozak, a world-renowned skin specialist, was in Toronto for about 10 days. I want to ask the minister why he was treated with such discourtesy, when all he wanted to do was to establish communications with the Ministry of Health and to discuss the offer made by this very ministry.

Hon. Mr. Grossman: With respect, Mr. Speaker, I object somewhat to the suggestion that he was not treated with the utmost courtesy. As the honourable member well knows, we have allocated $900,000 to a program at the Hospital for Sick Children -- a program that has three university teaching facilities backing it, with experts from those three institutions working on the kind of thing Mr. Kozak does.

Pursuant to that arrangement, offers have been made to Mr. Kozak comprising -- I want to get it exact -- a retainer fee of $10,000 per year, a consulting fee of $750 per day and travel time at $350 per day. Notwithstanding that offer, which was made last March, Mr. Kozak was unable to reach an agreement with those running the program. Extensive efforts have been made to get Mr. Kozak to participate in the program, including flying people to West Germany to meet with Mr. Kozak and his representatives. That was done over the summer.

Mr. Kozak was here last week and was invited once again to take up the offer made by Dr. Ramsay and his people. Mr. Kozak declined. He set out his own terms for participating. In essence, his lawyer was suggesting that he ought to open a private clinic or be offered a variety of other alternatives. Everyone was available to meet with Mr. Kozak's lawyer to discuss any arrangement he may have thought would have qualified Mr. Kozak under the existing legislation in this province. The solicitor for Dr. Ramsay would have been available if Mr. Kozak had wanted to sit down and discuss participation in that program under the terms and conditions set out. They declined to do that.

3 p.m.

I indicated to the member, as he well knows, that if Mr. Kozak's lawyer did not know the right persons to contact in order to see if the scheme he had worked out qualified under the legislation, we would be pleased to direct him to the proper persons who might be able to discuss with him the legalities of what he was proposing. That was not taken up either; therefore, Mr. Kozak has gone home.

I should take this opportunity to say very clearly to the member, and to the others who are taking Mr. Kozak's case to the public, that the Kozak treatment is available in Toronto. It is available here in Toronto through some of the best experts and specialists anywhere in the world. To the extent that efforts are made to suggest to the tragic sufferers of this disease that they can only get treated with "the Kozak treatment" by spending tens of thousands of dollars to fly to West Germany to be treated by Mr. Kozak himself, I suggest is somewhat of an injustice to those poor victims. They should be treated by the specialists here who are very well equipped to handle those cases.

Mr. Ruprecht: Mr. Speaker, the minister indicated just now that everyone was pleased to see Mr. Kozak and he was invited to see people. The minister will be aware that he is sometimes harder to get hold of than Alexander the Great was. Mr. Kozak's lawyer tried to get in contact with the minister. He did not receive a reply. He tried to get in contact with the minister's executive assistant and with Graham Scott, the deputy minister. He received no reply.

Mr. Speaker: A supplementary, please.

Mr. Ruprecht: I could go on, but that is precisely what I asked in my first question: Why was he treated in this very discourteous manner?

Here is my question: If the minister was willing and able to see Mr. Kozak at any time and to consider his offer, then why is it so hard for the minister simply to say he approached him and was approached by Mr. Kozak's solicitor? Why is it so difficult for the minister or for anyone in his ministry, including the solicitor the minister had indicated Mr. Kozak's solicitor should see -- and he too refused to see Mr. Kozak's solicitor -- to identify someone whom Mr. Kozak or his solicitor could see? The minister has not done that. If he is telling me now that he has, then I would say he is less than truthful, because of the figures I have.

Hon. Mr. Grossman: Let us make it very clear. The honourable member and I chatted three times last week here. He has had several conversations with my executive assistant as well. The member indicated that he was speaking on behalf of Mr. Kozak and his solicitor. I think it was reasonable for us to presume that communication to the member was responding to that direct request.

May I also indicate that we suggested that a meeting with the minister or the deputy would not be productive since -- and I want to make this clear -- no change of ministry policy with regard to opening private hospitals or giving direct billing privileges to a scientist such as Mr. Kozak would be permitted. There is no policy decision to be made here by the minister; therefore, meetings with the minister could not be productive in any way.

All that Mr. Kozak and his solicitor indicated to me, through the member, quite directly, was that they wanted an opportunity to meet with us to discuss a change in policy to see if he could open a private hospital. No dialogue is needed on that. The member may accuse the ministry of having a closed mind on that, but I am willing to stand here in my place and say, if it is the position of the Liberal Party of Ontario that special treatments should be provided through private hospitals, that is advocating quite clearly a two-tier level of medicine, which we on this side of the House reject.

We believe that treatments for epidermolysis bullosa and other diseases should be done by qualified experts through public general hospitals. I am not about to maintain a system where everyone who is able to develop an important new treatment makes it available to the citizens of this province through a series of private hospitals and private clinics. They are going to be available in the public general hospitals of this province; that is where they should be. That is why there will be no change of policy by this government or this ministry.

To the extent that Mr. Kozak's lawyer feels he has got a scheme that is workable under the laws of Ontario, this scheme should be committed to writing by his solicitor. It should be put to the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario for them to see if the arrangement is allowable and put to the ministry's solicitors to see if the arrangement worked out qualifies under the existing legislation.

I am not practising law; I should not be. My deputy is not practising law. It is up to the solicitors to determine whether the scheme he has drawn up meets the policy decisions of this government -- policy decisions, I suggest, that, while they may be rejected by the Liberal Party of Ontario, for which they should be ashamed, are grandly supported by the people of this province.

Interjections.

Mr. Speaker: Order.

Mr. Di Santo: Mr. Speaker, can we have the attention of the minister? We are for one medicine for everybody; that is why we are against opting out. I hope the minister will find a positive solution to his dealings with Dr. Kozak.

But in view of the fact that, despite his statement that Dr. Kozak's method is available in Ontario, still there are a number of patients -- and it is a very limited number, 40 people in Ontario -- who are going to West Germany to his clinic, is the minister considering finding, technically, any possible way of helping those patients who are in a very serious condition and who hope to go to West Germany but cannot avail themselves of the assistance of the Ontario health insurance plan?

Does the minister not think a way can be found so they can be reimbursed or financially helped rather than going to the general public, as is happening now? He has received a letter from the principal of Downsview secondary school appealing for one of the patients who lives in the riding of Yorkview.

Hon. Mr. Grossman: Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the member making that point. First, I should remind him and others that it is Mr. Kozak, not Dr. Kozak. That is crucial to this dialogue.

Second, I think it is terribly unfortunate that many people believe that this treatment is available only in West Germany. It is costing tens of thousands of dollars to send sufferers to the place they have been led to believe is the only place to have their disease treated. I should take this opportunity to urge all those people who know some EB sufferers to say to them, "Do not, in the tragic circumstances in which you find yourselves, spend $10,000 or $20,000 for a three or four week treatment in West Germany without first going to the clinic set up here under the auspices of the University of Western Ontario, McMaster University and the University of Toronto medical school with the leading skin specialists, perhaps, in North America, who had the Kozak treatment shared with them by Mr. Kozak a long time ago and who have been given almost $1 million to do research on that treatment and to work on it."

I can surely share, as the member can, the desire of these patients to go to the shrine of EB treatment, which is held to be West Germany. But in fact that treatment is available here. Not all sufferers should go immediately to West Germany; they should be going here. I fear that hundreds of thousands of dollars have been spent on treatments there that need not have been spent. To that extent, it is a terrible tragedy to put people to incredible cost when that is not necessary; and to the extent that Mr. Kozak and those supporting him have disseminated the proposition that the treatment is only available there, that too, I suggest, is very unfortunate. I would urge all members to help us to try and correct that situation.

3:10 p.m.

WAGE AND PRICE RESTRAINT PROGRAM

Mr. Cooke: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Treasurer. I would like to begin by quoting from his September 21 statement in the House, where he stated: "The fact is, we are not going to get this economy moving until people take their money out of savings certificates and start spending and investing it, whether it is by buying stocks or homes or cars. Until we have restored that confidence to spend and invest, we will not recover." I would like to ask the Treasurer how his wage control program, which will take $500 million out of the economy of the province, will conform with that economic principle to get Ontario's economy working again? Does he not agree that the result of taking $500 million out of the Ontario economy will mean a potential loss in the creation of 12,000 jobs in the province?

Hon. F. S. Miller: Mr. Speaker, I do not agree with any of the comments made by the honour- able member. Any money that I spend as wages to a member of the public service either comes out of the pockets of the taxpayers of the province or out of borrowings we make, in many cases from those same taxpayers because most of the moneys we use are Canadian moneys. In fact, in the case of Ontario, all of the moneys we use are Canadian moneys. Any moneys we either borrow or tax are not there to be spent in the balance of the economy, whether it is done by one route or another. Surely the most simple arithmetic will tell one that.

Let me use a technique that I am sure has been used many times, in geometry in particular, to prove that someone is wrong and that is to take the member's argument and extrapolate to the absurd. If he is right, I would need only to double the salary of everyone in the public service and there would be no unemployment because I would have increased the purchasing power so much they would be spending it all over here and we would all have jobs.

MOTIONS

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE

Hon. Mr. Wells moved that, notwithstanding standing order 64, private members' public business will not be considered on Thursday, September 30.

Motion agreed to.

MOTION TO SET ASIDE ORDINARY BUSINESS

Mr. R. F. Johnston moved, seconded by Mr. Mackenzie pursuant to standing order 34(a), that the ordinary business of the House be set aside to debate a matter of urgent public importance: that thousands of Ontarians on public allowances and benefits are falling further behind inflation and more deeply below the poverty line; that many more individuals and families will be on welfare as their Unemployment Insurance Commission benefits run out; that Workmen's Compensation Board recipients and other pensioners in receipt of the guaranteed annual income supplement need immediate action on their behalf; and that the Ministry of Community and Social Services has had before it since June a report urging the increase of social assistance benefits.

Mr. Speaker: I beg to inform all honourable members that notice of the motion has been received and the time complies with the standing order. I will be pleased to listen to the honourable member for up to five minutes as to why he thinks the ordinary business of this House should be set aside.

Mr. R. F. Johnston: Mr. Speaker, I rise at this time to raise this matter because I believe it is urgent and it is of public importance. This summer, hostels in this province have been full; they are usually half empty. People are sleeping in cars. People are sleeping outside. Soup kitchens have been full during this past summer. At the Scott Mission they serve over 700 people a day, something they have never seen since that mission has been open.

Single welfare recipients in the city of Toronto are spending 95 per cent and more of their income on rooming houses because there is no housing available for them. It is leaving them with nothing on which to eat. Yesterday I went to the Scott Mission with a group of mothers on general welfare and family benefits who were getting packages of food because the income maintenance system in this province does not provide them with the basic necessities.

For those people, this is an emergency and it deserves an urgent, not a stuttering and slow- minded response by the government. It is a hell of a lot more of an emergency than that of calling us all back here to bring in a phoney wage control package for the civil servants of this province. A committee of this Legislature, as well as a royal commission, has asked that single seniors be brought up to 60 per cent of the income of married seniors. It has not been done.

Single general welfare recipients are living at about 181 per cent below the new poverty line: $3,192 a year when Statistics Canada says they should get $8,970. That is an emergency. Those are dire straits for those people. We have had no indication there is going to be prompt action.

The Minister of Labour (Mr. Ramsay) says he is not going to bring in any Workmen's Compensation Board increases for people until the new year, even though the Premier (Mr. Davis) says he recognizes there has been 12 per cent inflation in this province in the last year. What are those poor people supposed to do, wait until the members opposite get off their asses and help them? They need help now.

An hon. member: Such language.

Mr. R. F. Johnston: They heard what I said. Only 18 per cent of family benefit recipients are even in public housing. Only 14 per cent of those on general welfare are in public housing. Huge numbers of them are not even eligible for public housing. A lot of those people are going to be without housing altogether this fall. If that is not urgent, I do not know what urgent is. If it is not the government's public responsibility to make these people its priority, instead of dumping on a few civil servants to make a fraudulent point in the economy of this province, I do not know what is.

Therefore, Mr. Speaker, I implore you to allow this debate. I implore you to allow us to show that the minister has had information before him from his own ministry since June and from the social services people in Toronto since May showing that people in Toronto were living at a deficit on their income maintenance. After taking off rent and food, they have had no money for anything else. He has known that since May and it has not been a priority. I do not see why I should believe he is going to do something before he decides Christmas starts or winter begins this year.

This is a minister who is fiddling around while the hopes of these people burn. This government should be telling them when it is going to create jobs, not how it is going to slap penalties on civil servants. That should be debated today and there should be a resolution of it at the earliest opportunity.

Mr. Boudria: Mr. Speaker, I, too, wish to speak in favour of what has been said by the member for Scarborough West. I represent a constituency which is suffering some of the highest unemployment in the whole province. In my riding, we heard recently that in Hawkesbury, a town of 10,000, 431 people are losing their jobs at the CIP plant. Shortly, those people will be on unemployment and shortly thereafter on welfare because there are no other opportunities for employment in the town of Hawkesbury at this time. The same holds true in various areas of the province.

I will again use examples from my own area to illustrate just how important this issue is. Last year, in the united counties of Prescott and Russell there were 864 welfare recipients. This year there are 1,068, an increase of over 200 in that short period of time. The amount spent has increased from $236,000 last year to $304,000 for the same month this year. At the same time, the government is spending massive amounts of funds on all kinds of different schemes.

In the last years and in the last months, despite the prophesy of the government and this new-found conversion to restraint, we have seen that restraint concerns everything except the way this government spends money on itself.

3:20 p.m.

I have just read statistics compiled by the Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing contained in the newsletter known as Background, which talk about the increase in welfare recipients. It says: "Last March, 24,354 people throughout Ontario were receiving general welfare assistance because they could not find jobs. This March, the figure was up to 32,665. The increase is particularly dramatic among those 25 years of age and under."

When I was speaking to the welfare agencies in my own constituency this morning, I was told that area was specifically of concern to the welfare administrator. Our young people are unemployed. There is little chance for them to find jobs; they are looking for welfare assistance and the amount they are getting is clearly insufficient.

The minister has told us that the figures drawn up by the city of Toronto were cooked, that they were not exact and that perhaps we were not 10th and last amongst the provinces. Perhaps we have the distinct honour of being ninth instead of 10th. I suggest that record is nothing to brag about, being ninth in the so-called province of opportunity. When I grew up, that title was right on the licence plates of motor vehicles, "Ontario, province of opportunity."

What kind of opportunity do the young people of this province have to look forward to when they are going to get $238 a month if they cannot get a job? It is not a matter of being lazy. My colleagues, the member for Kitchener-Wilmot (Mr. Sweeney) and the member for Essex South (Mr. Mancini), and I travel this province looking for methods of finding youth employment. We were surprised to see the enthusiasm that is still there amongst our young people. I do not know why it is there. They still have a good attitude and still want jobs. The only thing they can get right now is welfare and most of them do not even have a place to stay.

This summer, I discovered a man, a woman and their three children on the steps of the Legislature. They had decided to camp outside because they had no place to stay. For a number of days they were kept by a news reporter in this city who allowed them to live at her place. We are very grateful for that.

That illustrates that people who do not have a place to stay are not able to find any kind of accommodation on the general welfare assistance they are getting. I know the minister is going to talk to us about public housing. I will challenge the minister to tell us what good public housing does for the ones who cannot live in it. Granted some people do live in it, but most of them do not.

The handful of public housing units in my own constituency do nothing for those people who have no place to stay. The minister could have told that couple on the steps of the Legislature who could not find a place to live that everybody else had a public housing unit; but they did not. They had been trying to get in one for seven years. They could not find a place to live and they could not rent any other place with the amount provided to them.

We are told by the minister that he has increased all kinds of other benefits. He may have increased the Family Benefits Act rates and other areas helping the disabled on guaranteed annual income supplement. Today, for instance, we received notice that the Gains for senior citizens has been augmented. What we are concerned with now is the general welfare assistance rate. I am pleased to agree with the member for Scarborough West as to the urgency of this debate.

Hon. Mr. Drea: First of all, Mr. Speaker, let us be very factual and very accurate. There is a very deep problem in this province upon which this continuing recession has had a particular impact. The impact is on what the media are now starting to call "the new class of welfare" obviously is of significant public concern. The sheer numbers of those who have lost their jobs -- 474,000 in the province now, of which only some 20,000 odd have really shown up on social assistance; and if I had more time I could demonstrate that very accurately.

Mr. Elston: Have the debate and demonstrate all afternoon.

Hon. Mr. Drea: Let us see what unfolds as it unfolds. Then if we do not have a debate this afternoon I am going to speak on the Treasurer's bill. So the member may have to hear it anyway. Members sitting in those seats will not like it very much.

To get back to the motion, it is an all-encompassing one. Indeed, that was a rather lurid exposition of the problem. I think the member for Scarborough West, in his professed sensitivity towards the public, could give a rendition free from profanity and coarse references. After all, when he does that, he is degrading the people he pretends to have an interest in.

All of the remarks made by the member for Scarborough West in support of his motion have already been made in this House. Many of them were made yesterday. He never deviates from the script.

Mr. R. F. Johnston: Because you never do anything about it.

Hon. Mr. Drea: Therefore, I suggest the matter is not in itself urgent. It is a priority matter for the government that is being looked at in a very orderly and rapid fashion.

This year, we are going to spend $1 billion in this province just on direct payment of social assistance.

Mr. Foulds: And $10 billion on a nuclear station that you do not need.

Mr. Elston: That's an example of a failure.

Hon. Mr. Drea: It is not an example of a failure, it is an example of what happens when the economy slows down.

Mr. Roy: You are in last place.

Hon. Mr. Drea: We are not in last place and I have abundantly demonstrated that we are not.

If the member for Prescott-Russell (Mr. Boudria) wants to persist we can argue this again. Every time I argue with him privately he goes away with his head held low and says, "I will not mention it again." Then two or three months later, he pops up again. He is always confused.

Mr. Boudria: When have I said that.

Hon. Mr. Drea: To come back to this motion, no matter how much we debate it today, it will not accelerate in any manner, shape or form our remedial plan to deal with the problems of the recession in Ontario this winter.

I gave rather long answers today. Any reasonable person can read between the lines as to exactly what will be forthcoming in the ensuing days and weeks. But it must be an affordable package or it will only exacerbate the humanitarian deficits of the recession.

I find it strange that those who oppose restraint, those who stand for more inflation and for business as usual regardless of the consequences to people who have lost their jobs, regardless of the disabled and those on fixed incomes, that those who will not do anything to help their neighbour because they say, "I am all right, Jack," would be here today saying, "It is time to debate welfare."

Mr. Speaker: I have listened carefully and with great interest to the comments of all three parties. Quite frankly, I want to say that as a province we are indeed faced with a very serious problem. I recognize that and I do not want to diminish it in any way.

However, in my opinion, I must point out to the House that the proposed motion seeks to anticipate part of the amendment to the amendment to the budget motion which was moved by the member for Scarborough West (Mr. Cooke) and seconded by the member for Sudbury East (Mr. Martel) on May 20, 1982. I must advise all members that part of that amendment is substantially the same as the motion now proposed.

Moreover, Lewis's Parliamentary Procedure in Ontario, on page 40, states, "A motion for adjournment under this rule must be restricted to a single specific matter of recent occurrence, and having been discussed cannot again be brought up during the same session."

3:30 p.m.

In my opinion the terms of the proposed motion are too general to comply with this requirement and, indeed, appear to include several related matters rather than one specific matter. Therefore, I have to rule the motion out of order.

Mr. Laughren: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker: I wonder if you could tell us how that squares with the second emergency debate you allowed, on conditions in the Sudbury area.

Mr. Speaker: I felt quite obviously strongly enough that it did comply with the orders, and I did find in favour of it. That is the answer to that.

Mr. Foulds: Mr. Speaker, with great regret, respectfully we must challenge your decision. We consider poverty in this province, homelessness in this province, to be a matter of urgent public importance.

4:05 p.m.

The House divided on the Speaker's ruling, which was upheld on the following vote:

Ayes

Andrewes, Ashe, Barlow, Bennett, Bernier, Birch, Cousens, Cureatz, Davis, Dean, Drea, Elgie, Eves, Fish, Gillies, Gordon, Gregory, Grossman, Harris, Havrot, Henderson, Hodgson, Johnson, J. M., Kells, Kerr, Kolyn, Lane, Leluk, MacQuarrie, McCaffrey, McCague, McLean, McMurtry;

Miller, F. S., Piché, Ramsay, Robinson, Rotenberg, Runciman, Scrivener, Shymko, Snow, Sterling, Stevenson, K. R., Taylor, J. A., Treleaven, Villeneuve, Walker, Welch, Wells, Williams, Wiseman, Yakabuski.

Nays

Allen, Boudria, Bradley, Breaugh, Breithaupt, Bryden, Cassidy, Charlton, Conway, Cooke, Cunningham, Di Santo, Edighoffer, Elston, Epp, Foulds, Grande, Haggerty, Johnston, R. F., Kerrio, Laughren, Lupusella, Mackenzie, Martel, McClellan, Newman, Philip, Reed, J. A., Reid, T. P., Roy, Ruprecht, Ruston, Samis, Spensieri, Sweeney, Wildman, Worton, Wrye.

Ayes 53; nays 38.

ORDERS OF THE DAY

INFLATION RESTRAINT ACT (CONTINUED)

Resuming the adjourned debate on the motion for second reading of Bill 179, An Act respecting the Restraint of Compensation in the Public Sector of Ontario and the Monitoring of Inflationary Conditions in the Economy of the Province.

Mr. R. F. Johnston: When I adjourned the debate yesterday, I had been talking about the total sham of the price control section of this legislation in as much as all costs can be passed through, plus five per cent. I talked about the Minister of Housing and Municipal Affairs (Mr. Bennett) who I gather indicated he thought the various communities and municipalities around the province should not be able to pass through costs. They should not be able to consider major increases in their costs and therefore he is not going to be sending them as much money this year as he revises the amount of money he will be shipping off.

I would like to move on to speak about some of the things that could have been done, that should have been considered at this time in terms of an economic blueprint for the province. The issue of the day is not restraining the wages of 500,000 people, 100,000 of whom are unorganized and are living at very poor levels in this province already. The government's priorities should be the creation and preservation of jobs and -- dare I say it although the chair has ruled otherwise? -- in some emergency sense the plight of poor people in this province.

4:10 p.m.

We should be doing what my leader suggested, and that is building more nonprofit housing. There are thousands of people on waiting lists in Metro Toronto alone. There are almost 30,000 people trying to get into publicly assisted housing, because this government has not done enough to increase the public housing supply.

That would be so much more useful to this province than telling social workers in family counselling services in Toronto that they should take a five per cent increase as a maximum, maybe even a zero per cent increase -- I am not sure of their status in bargaining at the moment -- when they earn $18,000 or $22,000 a year. The government should do something positive to create some places to stay for the people I have been talking about who are on the streets; to create housing for women who have been beaten in their homes, whose husbands are still allowed to stay in their homes and who are unable to find housing in Metropolitan Toronto; and to create jobs for people to build those housing units.

Surely that is of more use than telling somebody in the Brant county welfare office he should be earning only five per cent more, maximum, than the $8,715 he is now pillaging from the government's coffers, that he is now just ripping the government off and exorbitantly demanding far too much from the huge revenues of Ontario. Surely if the government is going to come back with some kind of plan to give hope to the people of this province for getting out this recession, they would not come back and pick on that clerk who is making $8,700. They would surely come forward --

Mr. Rotenberg: They get nine per cent.

Mr. R. F. Johnston: Oh they can get zero and they will probably get about 6.6 or 6.7 per cent; that is great, wonderful.

Mr. Martel: Ask him what he lives on.

Mr. R. F. Johnston: Compared to what the member opposite makes or what I make, that is a pittance. Those people do not deserve to be blamed for the government's incompetence or the incompetence of the federal Liberals.

Why does the government not announce a major program of conservation to create skilled jobs around this province? If we were retrofitting homes instead of taking off the tax exemptions for things like storm windows and storm doors they might have been creating some jobs this fall.

Surely this makes an awful lot more sense than telling visiting homemakers in Prescott-Russell, as I mentioned before, that they should not earn much more than $6,597 a year because, my God, that is really ripping off the taxpayers, is it not? Those people who are providing home support services to elderly people in Prescott-Russell, those people who are trying to give the kind of services that surely the government wants to give to people in need in their homes in those communities should be able to earn only what -- $7,000 maximum? That is what the government thinks is fair? That is what they think should be a priority for a government at this point?

That is just total balderdash. This legislation is just so skewed, so black-minded, so nasty that it could turn on these people having no effect on the economy. The Treasurer (Mr. F. S. Miller) knows it is not going to have any effect on the economy. He even covered himself in his opening statement. He said he cannot guarantee this is going to do any good. Of course not. It is 0.5 per cent of our gross provincial product he is talking about. It is going to do nothing.

If the government decided it was time to put an extra tax on people, rather than selecting this group of people which has so far escaped the devastation those in the private sector have suffered, rather than deciding they should share in the devastation maybe they could have looked for some other means of raising money.

Why not a surtax on people with taxable incomes over $40,000 a year? Surely that is fairer than telling a children's aid society clerk he or she does not deserve to earn more than $10,000 a year, that he is taking too much out of the treasury, that he is the reason the economy is failing, that he deserves to suffer like the people laid off in the private sector. And that is your solution; that is exactly what the government has done.

Why not a two per cent surtax? Our estimates show it would create approximately $290 million. Instead of taxing 500,000 people whose salaries are not exorbitant and who do not have exorbitant expectations as I showed yesterday, why did the government not go to the 10 per cent of the people who earn taxable incomes of more than $40,000 a year?

Those are not the people who are suffering. They have been able to invest their money at high interest rates. They have been able to invest and profit from the misery of the people in the private sector who have been laid off. If the government had any sense of equity, surely these are the people they would have turned to for money rather taking it out of the pockets of small salary and wage earners.

Professional social workers who look after our kids are earning $23,000 a year. Why attack them, for goodness sake? It is just outrageous.

There are adjustments the government could have made to the taxation system in this province, such as rolling back sales taxes that have already hurt people at the lower end of the scale far more than they are hurting members of this House. The government has already punished them once this spring, now they insist on doing it again.

Mr. Boudria: Let them eat peanut butter.

Mr. R. F. Johnston: The government feels a nurse's aid in one of our homes for the aged deserves more taxation, deserves not only to be paying the sales tax added to almost everything that moved this spring, but that her wages should be limited as well, thereby, as my deputy leader has said, essentially taxing her again. It is a fundamentally mean-spirited act, especially when the government knows it is not going to do anything.

Mr. Martel: What is that going to do about interest rates established in the United States?

Mr. R. F. Johnston: That is a good point. What are our problems in the economy at the moment? High unemployment, high interest rates and high mortgage rates. What on earth is this going to do to change that? Not a darn thing.

I will not repeat myself at length on this, but in my view the government is going to turn worker against worker, to make those who do not have it at the moment and are being hurt jealous of those people who are just getting what we would expect for any working person -- job security and the ability to keep pace with the cost of living. What is so outrageous about that?

Most of these people have not received increases in the last couple of years higher than what the Premier (Mr. Davis) has told us was the rate of inflation, 12 per cent. He himself said that. That is not taking more out of the coffers than they deserve, especially at the pay levels we are talking about here.

What the government should have done is made sure that rent control worked and that people could actually afford their rent Instead, they allowed what is happening in my riding where, under the guise of carrying out major renovations, landlords are clearing out the occupants, making a few minor changes and then renting the place for about $400 more a month, excluding from the market people who would normally have lived in that kind of community. It is a new form of blockbusting.

4:20 p.m.

He could have done far more if he had tightened up the rent review rules, if he had perhaps changed the business of exempting buildings constructed since 1976 and if he had perhaps made sure people were not playing a lot of shenanigans with remortgaging which seems to me is what is happening out there. Surely that is far more use than attacking day care workers. The Minister for Community and Social Services (Mr. Drea) winced as I said that as if it is incredible I should suggest what this bill is doing is attacking day care workers.

Hon. Mr. Drea: No.

Mr. R. F. Johnston: No? You are admitting it is attacking day care workers.

Hon. Mr. Drea: No, I am reading something else.

Mr. R. F. Johnston: It is attacking day care workers and he can be sure of that, either the organized ones who happen to be making gross salaries of $14,000 a year or totally out of sight things like $17,000 a year, or the unorganized who are earning about $8,000 a year and some in private day care who are earning the minimum wage. All those people are covered under this bill, this gentle piece of legislation with all the arbitrary powers it gives to this board to stomp on those people. This government has made interesting choices.

He could have decided that energy costs could be frozen in terms of public transit. He could have decided that would be a positive thing to do at this stage instead of deciding that workers with the mentally retarded who are already overburdened and who already suffer burnout should have an extra pressure added. Give them only five per cent and let them figure out how they are going to pay $300 more on their mortgages. Ask them how they are going to finance their cars this year if they have to buy new ones. God forbid if they have to try to buy new ones on these salaries.

This is the most distorted piece of legislation we have seen in this place in a long time. The government's role should surely be to make jobs for people, to protect jobs for people so they can participate in this community with dignity, to protect those who do not have jobs and to protect those who have become victims of economic downturns.

The Premier, when he introduced this legislation, started it off with this statement, "Today represents a critical opportunity for the Legislature of this province to address those issues of vital concern to the health of our economy, our province and all its citizens." What do we get'? We get an attack on 500,000 people who are not being exorbitantly paid and we are told that is the solution.

It does not deal with single senior citizens. A committee of this Legislature and a royal commission recommended they should be brought as quickly as possible -- immediately might have been the word -- to 60 per cent of the amount of money a married senior citizens couple gets in this province so they could be above the poverty line.

This bill does not speak to those people. This bill does not speak to that commitment by a royal commission and a select committee of this Legislature. It ignores those people. It is sort of dangling this punishment that is going on for the civil servants saying: "This is going to solve it. This will help you." Some time or other, if one is part of the group the Minister of Community and Social Services decides to select as the good guys, one may actually get an increase this year.

This does nothing at all for people on minimum wage in the private sector who are already in total jeopardy. Those people know there are thousands and thousands of people behind them waiting for jobs at the minimum wage. They have no protection. They have no organization in terms of unions and are totally vulnerable.

As a province, we are now just about to become 11th out of 13 jurisdictions in this country in terms of the rate of our minimum wage. As of October 1, unless there is some surprise announcement from one or two of the provinces, we will be better off only than Newfoundland, a nickel more, and that is something to be proud of in this the greatest province, the province of opportunity.

Mr. Martel: Where else would you rather be?

Mr. R. F. Johnston: Where else would you rather be? "A place to stand, a place to grow." It is no place to grow if one is getting $3.50 an hour. It is no place to grow if one is getting $140 a week -- for example day care workers who are now going to be told they are frozen at that figure. An employer can come to a board and say: "With all my pass-through costs at the day care centre this year, with extra heating costs and having to replace equipment, I just cannot afford to pay these people the five per cent they want. I would like to suggest to the board that perhaps it only give them one or two per cent." And the board can make that decision. It does not have to hear from one day care worker. It can do it on the recommendation of an employer. That is justice, that is opportunity in Ontario.

The bill does not do a darned thing for Workmen's Compensation Board recipients. We have a minister who has the nerve to say in this House he will not do anything about it until the new year. Does he know what it is like to wait almost as beggars for droppings to come from this government? How can the government do that to people who have lost their ability to earn wages on the job, who are receiving benefits because some responsibility has been accepted by society for providing for them? Now the government is telling them that even though they have not had a raise since one year ago last July it is not going to look at this until the new year. The government comes out to hammer a group of civil servants, to make them feel part of that suffering too, so the working people of this province can really feel good about being in solidarity together in suffering. It is a great prescription for the future.

The bill does not do a darned thing for a handicapped person in this province. For some mysterious reason I do not understand, a single handicapped person is expected to get by with $414 a month in this province. We even accept that a single senior citizen should get $529, though we know that is below the poverty line and below any recommendation of any committee in this Legislature and of a royal commission. Those people are not being given a proper chance to get jobs and they are not being allowed a dignified amount of money to get by on.

The government has not addressed that. It has not said that is a priority. Today it has said it is not even an urgent matter. I will not deal with the ruling, but to say that is not an urgent matter for those people at this time of inflation is ludicrous. The Treasurer may say this is not relevant to his bill, but it is. When it was introduced the Premier said, "This speaks to those issues of vital concern to all its citizens." I am saying this bill does not deal with the issues that are of vital concern to handicapped people in this province.

The bill does not deal at all with family benefits recipients. Why should they feel good about this legislation coming in? What in this legislation is going to make those people feel that going to the Scott Mission to get food at the end of the month for their kids is just fine and everything is going to work out just dandy? There is nothing. The government has not spoken to those people and their concerns. It has not said they are a priority. It has said its priority is to punish the people who keep it in government, the people who do its work for it, some of it pretty dirty work.

4:30 p.m.

The Minister of Community and Social Services has said many times that we are not in 10th place in what we give our welfare recipients, specifically the scenario of one parent with one child put forward by the Social Planning Council of Metropolitan Toronto.

He has said, and I understand the complexity of the various schemes around this country, that you can build arguments that we are not in 10th place. I have never said we are, by the way; the Minister of Community and Social Services put those words in my mouth, I never said that.

The people in New Brunswick have a very complicated system with respect to their accommodation costs. I agree with that. It is difficult to say that we are absolutely in 10th place, but I defy the minister to cook the books well enough to show that we are not way down there somewhere.

Is the minister aware of the latest information that has just come out from the social planning council, which he was assuring me in some way the other day in response to my first question is using his statisticians now?

Hon. Mr. Drea: Hey, come on; I said they wanted to, you know that.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Cousens): Order.

Hon. Mr. Drea: You know that. Keep it accurate.

Mr. R. F. Johnston: I am sorry. I did find the minister's answers that day relatively difficult to follow. Perhaps he did say they wanted them, but I did not get the idea that he did not offer him or her, whoever it was.

But they have come out with new figures. Has the minister seen them today? He has not seen them yet.

Hon. Mr. Drea: Do you want to read them? We can have fun tomorrow.

Mr. R. F. Johnston: I just thought I would raise them with you again. I do not know whether they are right or wrong.

Hon. Mr. Drea: Oh.

Mr. R. F. Johnston: As I have never said, and you should keep yourself calm now --

Hon. Mr. Drea: I am very calm.

The Acting Speaker: I ask the honourable member to speak to Bill 179 and not to try to include a private conversation with another member. If he is doing so, it is by his riding or his title.

Mr. R. F. Johnston: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Minister of Community and Social Services was the one I was perhaps gibing as I make my comments on whom this is not dealing with.

The figures they have just come out with show that in some cases we are in 10th place in short-term rates, as they put it; in other cases we are in ninth place. I will be happy to send these over to the minister if he has not received them, but I presume he will have received them.

No matter how you look at those comparative figures across the country, and no matter how you cook the books, we are low.

Hon. Mr. Drea: I do not cook the books, you do.

The Acting Speaker: Order. We are talking to Bill 179.

Mr. R. F. Johnston: I am absolutely talking to Bill 179 and why the principles of this bill have no relevance to these people.

No matter how you look at it, we have people living at ridiculously low levels in this province. The latest Statistics Canada poverty line for a single male in a major city is $8,970. The minister can quibble with that if he wishes to, I do not really care; but no matter how he adjusts it -- down $500, $600 or $700 -- he has to understand that a single, employable welfare recipient in this province receives $3,192, or $266 a month.

That is not an urgent case of poverty. As early as May, social services in Metro Toronto indicated that in the case of a single employable under 65 in Metro who gets an allowance of $266 a month the average rent at that time was $200 and the average food costs were $77.52. This left those people, after rent and food, with a deficit of $11.52 for filling any other kind of basic needs one might have in personal hygiene, transportation, one's ability to communicate with other human beings or whatever it might be.

This is not urgent. This is something that was raised in this House in May. The minister was advised that this needed to be addressed, but he will not address it because, he says, he has not known over the last couple of months what the increase is going to be in total numbers.

It is true that you have to look at this in terms of total budget consideration, but there are living human beings in this province who in the meantime are living in those conditions, who are taking all their money to rent rooms and who then are walking the long walk to the Scott Mission for one meal a day in this province in 1982.

That is not a matter of urgent debate. That is not a matter that is considered in this bill. This bill does not say anything to those people. There is nothing to repair the economy. All it does is attack the people who have been serving this province well, our civil servants and the people who provide our social service facilities around the province.

I could go on at length about the problems of people who have already been cast aside by our society; they have already been refused the ability to have a job in the society. The SKF workers for whom we did not go to fight to stop the arbitrary closing of their plant will soon have gone through their Unemployment Insurance Commission payments. After 26 years of paying their taxes to Scarborough and to Ontario they will maybe find themselves on our welfare rolls. This was an act that should never have happened, that should not be acceptable to anybody in this House and that we could have stopped if the government had the will.

The point I would like to make is that this bill, coming as it does when I have people like that in my constituency, is so offensive that it is like throwing dirt in their faces. It is like saying that the way the government is going to get out of this thing is to punish other people.

I will fight this thing with everything I have got. Somehow we will get it out to a committee where people can come in and talk about how this is going to affect them in personal ways. The government and the polls by which they want to live may learn that they and their polls will also be their downfall. If they are working as government, as honest politicians, they have to deal with some kind of principle and some kind of ideology; they cannot just follow the whims of a poll, especially when they know it does not mean anything.

A government that stays in power, knowing that it is doing so by fooling the people, is a government that will be found out and turfed out. I hope that as we talk about this bill and as we bring this bill to committee, we will set the scenario for the people of Ontario to see what this government is like and to throw them out at the next election.

Hon. Mr. Drea: Mr. Speaker, just for the record: the member for Scarborough West for some peculiar reason said I was wincing at something he said. I was not wincing; I was merely reading an article in the Nation. There are some magnificent lines in that. I will use one or two of them in the foreseeable future. Quite frankly, if indeed I were to wince it would be at the very shabby, very shallow and, on occasion, very shoddy and totally disappointing remarks of those who are opposed to this bill. Before I get into that --

Mr. Martel: Spare us.

Mr. Cooke: This will be a first.

Mr. McClellan: Always a class act, eh, Frank?

Hon. Mr. Drea: There is a difficulty over there. When they try to circle a square and find out that it cannot be done, the only refuge they have left is to bleat and whine and complain; and there it comes -- onwards, onwards, onwards.

Mr. Martel: Tell us how to fight high interest rates.

Hon. Mr. Drea: I am going to divide my remarks into two areas today. First of all, I want to talk about the parts of this bill that particularly affect my ministry and the agencies in the community, either the municipalities or private social agencies that are covered by the scope of this piece of legislation.

4:40 p.m.

It is very interesting. I have met with four of the major groups that are covered: the Ontario Association for the Mentally Retarded; the Ontario Association of Homes for the Aged, which encompasses both municipal and charitable homes; children's mental health centres, which are entirely in the private sector albeit their fees are paid by us; and the umbrella group, the Ontario Association of Children's Aid Societies, which societies are primarily funded by this ministry although, quite frankly, there is a significant level of municipal participation in their funding.

They see the need for public restraint based upon one fundamental consideration, that one cannot go on in this country with the present level of inflation, the present costs of doing business and the economic pressures that have been placed upon them. They are cognizant of the fact that a very significant portion of their employees is in the lower quadrant of the pay scale. They appreciate that this government, this cabinet, and particularly this Treasurer (Mr. F. S. Miller), have dealt with this issue in a fair and sensitive manner, because those on the lower levels will receive their mandatory increases, which in many cases at the bottom of the scale will exceed the five per cent.

Mr. Cooke: This legislation is about as sensitive as you are.

Hon. Mr. Drea: Maybe that is because I had a great deal to do with it.

Mr. Cooke: That explains it.

Mr. Martel: You shouldn't brag about it.

Hon. Mr. Drea: The next time we are in an election, the member will be running for cover. He will not want to recall the things he has said in the past few days.

Mr. Martel: Why don't you call one now?

Mr. Cooke: Call one now. We'll be glad to take you on.

Hon. Mr. Drea: If we were to call one now, surely the member's argument about the polls would disappear. Does he mean to say he has been fooling around with the polls, saying we did it because it would be popular? I have heard him say that.

Mr. Martel: You have the polls. You know what the feds have said.

Hon. Mr. Drea: I have heard the member say over and over again: "You are not doing it on principle. You are doing it because it is popular." If they now want us to call an election, either they are kamikaze pilots -- and knowing their profound interest in economics, I doubt that they are kamikaze pilots -- or they feel the polls are wrong. If they feel the polls are wrong, then let us get off the argument about popularity versus principle.

One of the problems that has been affecting the ability of the delivery service in the four significant areas of social services I have referred to is the fact that traditionally, not only during their budget year -- some are by calendar year rather than the province's fiscal year -- but also during the province's fiscal year, there have been arbitrations or settlements of labour negotiations which have not been based upon the ability to pay.

Indeed, the impact of those arbitrations without regard for ability to pay has put many of the agencies in a very untenable position in terms of their delivery service. It is untenable to the point where the constant concern expressed to the province is that the deficits incurred by those arbitrations have to be met by the province by picking up the deficits.

Mr. Foulds: Are you talking about the doctors' settlements, Frank?

Mr. McClellan: Which arbitrations, Frank? Tell us which ones you are talking about.

Mr. Foulds: Name names. You have them in your file there.

Hon. Mr. Drea: Mr. Speaker, the NDP members can barrack all day. I am going to pay no attention to them for the very simple reason that ever since last Tuesday they have humiliated themselves publicly. They have made fools of themselves. They are going down the pike. If they want to shout to the wall or bay to the moon, and that seems to be their preoccupation, then they can be my guest. I am going to speak to the Speaker. I am going to pay no attention to them.

However, because I do not want those members coming outside and crying on my shoulder at some future time, I want to say to them that I do hear very well through this ear; I know those members' voices. So let them bay at the moon, but they had better be very careful how it is done if they do not want some retaliation in the near future.

I would like to return to this bill. However, I suppose as one final parting shot, let me say that the NDP members have so little to offer on this subject that they are an absolute disgrace to left-wing thought. They have not produced a single thing here. There is more radical thought in the Conservative caucus on Tuesday morning than there is in that vast assemblage over there. Indeed, that is why they are shrinking: they are not as big as they used to be, and they know it.

To come back to what I was talking about: the particular concern about the sudden impact of those wage increases has prevented the people in charge of delivering services in this field from being able to take a look at the type of service that should be delivered in a particular changing time.

One of the benefits of this restraint legislation is that there is a very clear, very stable and very orderly period ahead when many of the social concerns, particularly those changed by changing demographics, particularly those coming about from the new economics --

Mr. Cooke: It is called Reaganomics in Ontario.

Hon. Mr. Drea: -- particularly those coming about by necessity because of the restructuring of the private sector in order that the private sector can survive --

Mr. Cooke: That one is called plant shutdowns.

Mr. Mackenzie: Are you going to legislate a restructuring of the private sector, Frank?

Mr. Martel: Watch interest rates go up after the American elections. What are you going to do then?

The Deputy Speaker: Speak to me, minister.

Mr. Cooke: Now continue with this very deep speech.

The Deputy Speaker: Order.

Hon. Mr. Drea: Mr. Speaker, I do not mind a bit of barracking, but when it comes from the member who is universally acclaimed as number 125 in this House, I suggest that he go outside and shout at somebody else.

In this restraint period there is obviously going to have to be, not only in consultation with the province and the federal government but also with the municipal sector and the private social agencies, a very new and very significant approach to what is going to be required in the totality of the social order, not only in this decade but also in the decade ending this century.

4:50 p.m.

Mr. Foulds: Would you mind repeating that?

Hon. Mr. Drea: I will be delighted to repeat it. Unlike the member for Port Arthur, I do not read anything.

Mr. Cooke: We know that.

Mr. Foulds: It shows.

Hon. Mr. Drea: I do not have a little peon of a scriptwriter doing mine for me and then stand up as the great poseur with my three levels of books and recall my fond days as a teacher of dramatic arts, not me.

I will be delighted to repeat that.

Hon. Mr. Walker: Who are you talking about? Who was that?

Hon. Mr. Drea: Who else would it be? I have met lots of people who stood on books, but I never met anybody before who leaned on them.

Obviously the totality of the social order includes education; colleges and universities, particularly for skills training; and all social services, particularly those to the elderly and those to the near elderly, which is a field that has not been properly addressed; along with the very many dimensions and sides of health.

There has to be a real look taken at the necessary services that are going to have to be provided, how we are going to afford those in a country whose economic base is not expanding -- and it is obvious a considerable period of time will be required before it expands to anywhere near what we have come to expect as normal. Obviously these restraints and this type of bill are required.

I found it very interesting that the opponents of this bill, locked deeply as they are in rather antiquated Keynesian economics, came out arguing about a double standard. I have heard about the double standard on quite a few occasions. If ever there was a double standard, it has been coming from over there.

What they are really saying is that notwithstanding the tremendous impact on the private sector, notwithstanding the dreadful unemployment figures -- and virtually 90 to 95 per cent of those who are unemployed are from or derive their earnings from the private sector -- notwithstanding the tremendous amount of social chaos, involving not merely an isolated case but relatively large numbers of people who have lost their expectations of even a part of the Canadian dream, who look at the interest rates, at the down payments and at the affordability, and regardless of what their collective agreements are providing them they have found they are only chasing inflation two or three or four or five points behind, six months or a year or two years behind, they are unable to look forward to what they really want, a stable, orderly future where they can make plans.

Suddenly, the affordability of their basic commodity, which is a home, is completely eroded by one of two things: inflation, which makes a mockery out of their wages, no matter how strong their collective bargaining; or the collapse of their employer, which makes a mockery out of any form of job security; or at particular ages, especially over 45, of their ability at any time in the foreseeable future to get back to anywhere near the type of income they regarded not as normal but as absolutely necessary for what they considered to be just a standard of living.

Mr. Wildman: That is all true, and this bill does absolutely nothing for these people.

Hon. Mr. Drea: I appreciate very much the honourable member's vote of confidence. I thank him very much for saying it is all true. Unlike my critics, I do not put things forward here and say, "I don't know whether this is right or wrong, but it sounds interesting; so I will try to promote it." I do appreciate very much that vote of confidence.

What is really being said here is that, notwithstanding what is happening in that private sector, notwithstanding what is happening to large numbers of people and notwithstanding the very genuine fears and concerns about their future, those of us who are in the public sector are the elite, we will carry on business as usual, we will completely carry on just as though nothing else is happening out there. That is what is being argued, that is what is being said. If there ever was a double standard it emanates from the NDP benches.

Mr. Wildman: What a despicable argument.

Mr. Grande: You haven't heard a word that was said.

Hon. Mr. Drea: Unfortunately, my arguments tend to be described only the way they are when they suddenly hit home. When the deputy leader of the New Democratic Party started off the debate, I was fascinated; I was prepared to be here, because he said it would be a parliamentary battle like we have seldom seen before.

I thought, "I am going to sit here because surely, from those supposedly so preoccupied with the economy and the social order that they neglect other things, we will now see something of great and enormous significance. No more quiet acquiescence as in Ottawa. No more shrugs about a worldwide condition. None of the restraints a province really cannot do much about because it is national or continental."

I thought there would be a real thrust because, after all, if we are told there is to be a battle like battles seldom seen, expectations are aroused.

What has come forward? Virtually all of it must have been copied out of a book describing things that Mr. Roosevelt did in the United States or Mr. Bennett and Mr. King in Canada in 1929, 1931, 1932 or 1933. There is absolutely nothing new in it except: "Leave us alone. Leave the public sector alone." That might be an argument if everybody were in the public sector. I suppose, ideologically, that has some appeal, that might be the position one would want to take.

I was profoundly disturbed because the opponents show a very real intellectual chaos about this bill. That party believes in public ownership. Yet what is its prime target in the industrial field? The largest publicly owned corporation in the province: "Down with Hydro." I imagine it is very popular with the local union at Hydro. I can just see the contributions rolling in. What a way to job security. Vote NDP so it can cripple the expansion of Hydro. That is what it really wants to do. It is saying that Flydro has expanded too much, roll back Hydro.

This really sounds like something that might be heard in the United States where it is a privately owned company so there are concerns about having to pick up its debentures, as one would in New York state with Niagara Mohawk or in some of the other states with the various components of the Edison corporation. What a way to stimulate the economy, slash Hydro.

Mr. Wildman: It's not jobs.

Hon. Mr. Drea: It is not jobs? Well I am looking at the Speaker and he is looking at me. Maybe the member should also look at the Speaker, because he can tell him how many jobs there are with Hydro. He can say how many are out there.

Mr. Wildman: It is not job intensive, it is capital intensive.

5 p.m.

Hon. Mr. Drea: The NDP used to want to expand Hydro and at one time, at least, they used to regard the nuclear expansion of Hydro as one of the cornerstones of Ontario's industrial policy. It was publicly owned and it was that generation from the public sector that was doing so much for Ontario industry.

Mr. Cooke: You are nuts.

Hon. Mr. Drea: Now who are the opponents of Hydro? It is not the bond houses that bought a 10 per cent coupon or a slice of the action on the debentures; not that national group they talked about, whatever its name is -- and I do not want to get it confused because one of their people is the front for another one that uses somewhat the same type of wording but it is on another topic, we will come to that another day.

They are talking about a group of national industrialists. They are not opposing the expansion of Hydro. Indeed, it is those friendly boys from the country, the local NDP members, the local pro-labour members, who have been opposing. Part of the argument about this bill has been about a freeze on transit rates. That is redundant because when one is putting restraint on the wages, the municipally owned transit company will be able to restrain on its labour costs. If it has to pay more for fuel, because that is part of a national energy package, then surely it is not going to ask the municipal taxpayers to absorb the cost of the national energy program.

This is what restraint is all about. If one freezes and they have to pay more and more for gasoline, diesel oil or what have you, then who is going to pick up the bill when the local transit company is in difficulty? If they are going to ask the province to do so, then they are asking us to raise the personal income tax or retail sales tax, and who pays that? The very same person who pays the property tax locally, one way or another.

They put together a very weak and very feeble package, one so weak and so feeble, incidentally, that I guarantee in the election on November 4 they will not be talking about it very much up there in the borough of York. My friends, that may be the true test.

There has been the particular attack here that this government is dividing workers, that we are trying to foment and to encourage some kind of proletarian divisiveness, when indeed it is those who are attacking, those who are treating most cavalierly a goodly number of people who work, whether they work with their hands or in offices or with machines in the private sector, who are creating the very divisiveness. It is emanating from that side because they are saying on the one hand the private sector has to make adjustments and those adjustments are dreadful; and on the other hand for those in the public sector, no, we will go on, we are not part of any attempt to be responsible, or any movement or program to introduce new ideas. They are actually trying to promote a double standard, one for those in the public sector and one for those who choose to work in industries where the ability to pay is so paramount that when there is no money left the operation must close.

We cannot have it both ways. We cannot have the impact of a very changed economy primarily affected by the world prices of oil -- and I am not going to get into the merits of the world prices of oil, but we have an economy that was so preoccupied, that was trying to go on as usual notwithstanding the enormous impact upon its industry that literally began to run out of steam. It was trying to supply a market that had great expectations that everything would go on as usual including a normal amount of inflation. By virtue of the fact that costs were becoming higher and beginning to escalate, that normal amount of inflation spilled over, began to climb and indeed began to threaten every sector of society, public or private.

We have had partial attempts through a monetary policy to control it. I do not want to get into the merits of those except to say they have been with us for a considerable period of time. I suggest that no reasonable person expects a very sudden change in the monetary system that will bring back the good old days.

Again, there is the very legitimate concern about how long government can build a pyramid of deficit upon deficit. I am not one of those who believes that a balanced budget for its own sake is necessarily a good thing. It can be a good thing or it can be a bad thing. But one thing is guaranteed, stacking deficit upon deficit in geometric rather than arithmetical progression only spells disaster at the end of the line. It always has and it always will.

There is a time in any country when there must be a total participation in a national effort to meet a national problem. The federal government has moved. Whether they have moved far enough or whether they will be able to unravel some of the problems they have created, only the future will tell.

By the same token, there is an obligation upon the provinces as there is upon every individual. We want to preserve a social order where we are trying to meet needs in a most humanitarian manner, one which ensures dignity for old age and opportunity even where there is not much potential. Much of the money from my ministry is spent in providing opportunity where there is realistically not much potential. I happen to be one of those who feels that is a very important, significant and indeed a mandatory investment.

If there is to be a proper allocation, one that will provide opportunity and dignity and enhance the basic humanity of the province, then there has to be restraint right now.

There must be time for everyone to look at the very structure of our social programs because they are not structured. They came about during the great expansion in the 1960s and 1970s. They were expanded on almost an ad hoc basis; and that is fine but the world has changed. The world not only changed in 1975 and 1979, the world, as we knew it, changed on the night of June 28, when the federal Minister of Finance told us exactly what was going on. I do not think the world, as we knew it, is ever going to be the same again, so it is incumbent upon us now to discipline ourselves. In that self-discipline, because that is really what it is, and self-discipline always means giving up something, we must ensure there is a sensitivity, which I think has been demonstrated in this bill, and there is a foresightedness.

5:10 p.m.

We in this government have never said this was the answer. Of course, we do not think along compartmentalized lines like some. We have never said it was the total answer to the problem. We have said it is something that must be done, and other things must and should be done. Mr. Speaker, there will be very significant things done on the floor of this Legislature by this government, but without this restraint all we would be doing is chasing the will-o'-the-wisp of inflation, spending money to chase after money, building up deficit after deficit and coming to the point where we would have to erode or perhaps even terminate many of what I like to think of as the essential humanitarian services in Ontario.

I also want to point out that there have been some allegations that the cabinet was indecisive in all of this.

Mr. T. P. Reid: You just could not make up your minds, that is all.

Hon. Mr. Drea: No. The cabinet was quite definite, and not in the month of September, and not necessarily only in the months of August and September either. What the cabinet of this province did was to allow the Treasurer to consider all the options to find the fairest approach towards accepting and meeting our responsibilities.

It did not make a sudden elephantine lurch into something because it appeared to be popular or easy to explain. Quite the opposite. It is very ironic that those who accuse us of that are exactly the people who are doing it in this debate. They are lurching from point to point. They are trying to grab on to something because it is Tuesday, and they will abandon it because it is Thursday. That is the final irony.

This is a good bill. It is a fair bill. I believe its results will be far more impressive than even the optimists forecast. The person on the street, that reasonable person on the street, sees why this has to be done and supports it because he or she knows it is necessary. It will bring about, along with a significant number of other approaches, a return to the stable society that not only everybody should want but everybody has come to believe is the reasonable expectation of his economic right.

Mr. T. P. Reid: Mr. Speaker, it is with a certain sadness that I rise to participate in this debate. It seems to me, given the topic and the seriousness of the problem we are all faced with, this has not been one of the more illuminating or edifying debates we have had.

My friends to the left have reacted in their usual way with a great deal of hyperbole and with complete ignorance of any kind of economic or financial responsibility... On its side the government, after months of dithering and waiting for the public opinion polls to show them in three or four months consecutively that the people were in favour of such a program, has finally delivered forth after a long gestation period the bill we have before us.

I was disappointed -- and I say to the Treasurer (Mr. F. S. Miller) that I appreciate the fact he is sitting through this debate. It seems to me there are good reasons for bringing in such legislation if one wants to argue them, but the Treasurer has not done that. There are good reasons against this kind of legislation, and my friends to the left in their knee-jerk reaction have not put them, either.

Mr. R. F. Johnston: That is not the case; I gave a really good speech.

Mr. T. P. Reid: I thought the member's speech on one small aspect of the problem, social welfare, was not bad; not approaching excellence, but not bad. But other than that I think the Treasurer really owed us as a House and as the public of the province more of an explanation, more of a setting of the scenario for the economic difficulties Ontario finds itself in today.

I was surprised, given that he has all these people in the Treasury and the staff he has, that he would make such a few short comments on the introduction of the bill and not deal with the various economic conditions that we have in Ontario. In particular, my friends to the left, displaying a somewhat naive view of economics, have been yelling about the interest rate. The interest rate, I would say to my friends, is simply a reflection of the underlying malaise that the province and the country are facing. The interest rate is not causing inflation; the high interest rate is a result of the problems we have and is the leading symptom or indicator of the problems that we in Canada and the world are facing. The interest rate is not the problem.

Mr. Cooke: This is your in-depth analysis?

Mr. T. P. Reid: If my friend would be quiet, he might possibly learn something.

Mr. Cooke: I listened to you for eight hours earlier this year and I did not learn a damn thing from what you said.

Mr. T. P. Reid: Obviously, you and some of your colleagues have learned how to use what I consider to be unacceptable language in this chamber and have not learned very much about economics.

I will allow myself to be diverted just for a minute, because Anthony Westell was on Canada Broadcasting Corp. radio yesterday, and he gave a very cogent and concise description of why both the New Democratic Party and labour were so irrelevant in their approach to the problems facing Ontario and Canada today. Did you hear that, George?

Hon. Mr. Ashe: No, but I want to hear it right now.

Mr. T. P. Reid: It is worth hearing. Basically, he said they had no understanding of economics; they had no understanding of finances; they had no understanding of the underlying causes of inflation; they refuse to accept that all of us have some role to play in fighting inflation and that wages, whether we like it or not -- and I am not picking on the labour sector -- contribute to inflation.

5:20 p.m.

When one looks at the industrial sector where wages are 60 to 70 per cent of the cost, and looks at Ontario where wages are 60 to 70 or 80 per cent of the cost, to say wages are not part of the problem is to be an ostrich -- it being fitting to use the analogy my friends are fond of throwing across the floor.

I am not here today to say that wages are the cause or the only cause of inflation, but certainly we all have to admit that they are one of the components --

Mr. Cassidy: You are here to associate yourself with the Tory program. You are a Tory in disguise.

Hon. F. S. Miller: Certainly in disguise.

Interjections.

The Deputy Speaker: Speaking to the Speaker.

Mr. T. P. Reid: I thought with this beard I looked like a hippy radical Socialist myself, Mr. Speaker, but as we know appearances are deceiving. Let me go on. We have high interest rates for three or four --

Mr. Cassidy: I guess you think Pierre Trudeau knows all about the economy. Is that right?

Mr. T. P. Reid: I am sorry. I would be willing to let the member speak for a minute if he had anything to say.

The Deputy Speaker: We are having trouble with interjections and I am sure all members will respect the member who has the floor at present.

Mr. T. P. Reid: We have high inflation and high interest rates for a number of reasons. One reason is oil prices. In this country we are only now catching up to the rest of the world which accommodated itself to higher world energy prices when the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries got its act together, if one wants to put it that way, in the early 1970s and drove up energy prices.

We in Canada and Ontario were insulated from those increases. As a result of the new energy program in Ottawa, and of the fact Ottawa insulated us from those higher costs earlier on in the 1970s and 1980s, we are now suffering that particular problem.

Another cause of the high interest rates is obviously high government spending, not only in this country where the federal government is running a deficit of $20 billion, where over 20 per cent of its budget is going to pay for the interest on the national debt -- and we have that problem in Ontario where 10.3 per cent is going to service our debt -- but one of our largest problems is the $100 billion deficit the United States is running this fiscal year.

That money has to come from somewhere and the governments either print it, which has been the easy way out in the past, or borrow it or use some combination of the two. Obviously, if one is going into the market to borrow these sums of money, supply and demand dictates the price is going to go up.

Interest is the price paid for the use of money. It is related to supply and demand. The demand has been high, partly because of governments at all levels getting into the market or requiring funds; so the price goes up.

But probably the most important reason basically, and they are all related and this is an oversimplification for my friends who have left, is that people who have money themselves, or who are the savers or the corporations that have money, are not lending it to the banks or other lenders on a long-term basis because of one fundamental reason: they are afraid of what inflation is going to do to that money if they lend it out over long periods of time.

The money that is available in the capital pools around the world is being put into short-term monetary instruments or is not being lent for more than one to three years. The bond market has suffered. The people who have money and the corporations and banks are saying, "If you want us to take a chance on a five, 10 or 20 year loan, you are going to have to pay us an awfully high premium to take that risk, because with the way inflation and the way the economy is going, we do not know whether the dollar we are lending you today will be worth two bits two or three years from now." That is one of the problems. It really got to the point, for those people who are concerned about the high rate of interest, where the lenders who had lent for long periods of time were losing money.

In the early 1970s and even in the later 1970s it paid to borrow $10,000 and to pay it back over the next five or 10 years because we were paying back in inflated dollars. The person who had lent the money for a long period of time was losing money because inflation had eaten up the profit he would have made and the real purchasing power of those funds had fallen.

That is one of the reasons we have high interest rates. Until people's expectations and fears of continuing high inflation come down that interest rate is not going to come down and stay down long enough to do our economy very much good.

One of the real problems with inflation is that of high and rising expectations. That is why I very reluctantly support this bill. I do not like the bill. I think it is inequitable and I do not think it is fair. This party called for an across-the-board private and public response to the problems that are facing us. We would like to see those people at the lower levels be notched higher and be given more than what amounts to a pitiful 6.7 per cent increase. We will move those amendments when the time comes.

At the same time, it is absolutely essential that we grapple with this problem in our society and that we bring down the rate of inflation. The only thing I really agree with, as far as the last budget of Allan MacEachen goes, is that inflation and jobs and job creation are tied together. If we have this continuing inflation we are not going to have companies and individuals investing, one, because they do not know what kind of return they can reasonably expect and, two, they can make more money on relatively short-term monetary instruments now without investing for a profit some time down the road. Money has been fleeing this country and will continue to do so as long as we have high inflation.

The other thing is, if we can bring down inflation in this province and in Canada we are all going to be better off. If we can get the inflation rate down by five or six per cent, which is forecast by some economists for 1983-84, that will mean everybody's real purchasing power will increase by six per cent. We all have a stake in this, each and every one of us. Most of us here are in reasonably good shape but the people who have really been suffering are the seniors on old age pensions and old age security programs. They have really been suffering and will continue to suffer unless we can do something about this particular problem.

As usual, I find a certain amount of hypocrisy on the part of the government. They are not asking the civil servants to take a cut but are asking them not to have their increases go up as fast as they might. In the Globe and Mail of September 25, 1982, the headline on page 5 is, "Tories haven't started own cuts." The cabinet has not started paring its own programs. The only thing that we know the government has done is cancel the jet, that symbol of what one can only call a hypocritical government which brings in this kind of legislation but continues its own habits of conspicuous consumption.

5:30 p.m.

We are not supposed to attribute motives in this House, and I certainly do not want to do that. I would suggest, however, one of the fundamental reasons we have this bill before us is not because it is going to achieve whatever the Treasurer tells us -- and he has a different excuse each and every day; we have already discussed the public opinion polls that indicated it would be popular and, therefore, we have it regardless -- but because the Treasurer is really concerned. He has signals, from both New York and Montreal, that if he is not very careful the province is going to lose its triple-A credit rating.

That is really the Treasurer's main concern, because all his credibility hinges on that credit rating. He and his predecessors have used that as their main excuse and main line for years: "Regardless of what you people in the opposition think, we have our triple-A credit rating." They wave that around as if it were the be-all and end-all. Obviously, to the Treasurer it is, and for two reasons. If we lose that triple-A rating, obviously the cost of borrowing to the province, or specifically to Ontario Hydro, is going to go up. In addition, the Treasurer's career will sink just as fast as the credit rating might.

What is the government doing about restraining its own expenditures? We already know we are spending $325 million this fiscal year on Suncor. We are spending another $10 million on the Trillium fund. Some of the members may have seen in the Globe and Mail Malcolm Rowan's asinine and pathetic defence of that expenditure. It seems to me there are more Morley Rosenbergs around than the Toronto Star has uncovered. We have Kirk Foley in the Urban Transportation Development Corp. and we have Malcolm Rowan. I just do not know what these people have on the government that they should be allowed the unrestrained and certainly unconstrained leeway they have with the public's money.

Mr. Speaker, I am just going over some of these things to remind you. I have already talked about Suncor, Minaki Lodge --

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Cousens): The honourable member is speaking to Bill 179.

Mr. T. P. Reid: I am talking about the bill -- Minaki Lodge, public opinion polls, provincial land banks, foreign exchange losses, regional government costs and, I might add, the regional educational costs our Premier brought in, the costs of royal commissions -- the one on the northern environment is still going, and we have spent something like $2.2 million. Judy LaMarsh ate her way through about $2.2 million for a royal commission that came up with 87 recommendations, all of which were outside the jurisdiction of the province. Government advertising might go down a little since there is no election year, but there are the policy secretariats, those toothless wonders, the executive jet -- that we now know about -- and so on.

The Acting Speaker: The member may continue to speak on Bill 179.

Mr. T. P. Reid: Yes, Mr. Speaker, I will do that. It is interesting that we should be here in 1982 talking about restraint and cutbacks. As a new member, sir, you might not be aware of a little report called the Report of the Special Program Review. This was produced by the then Treasurer, one W. Darcy McKeough. We all remember him. He was the last, best Treasurer we had in the province. It is very interesting that he tabled this report on November 20, 1975. It is almost a Bible.

If the government really wanted to restrain government expenditures, all it would have to do is go back to this. There are some fantastic ideas in it. I just want to reiterate one because the government keeps talking about the fact it never really gave any Edmonton commitment. I want to read into the record Darcy McKeough's comments about the Edmonton commitment. He said:

"I think it appropriate at this time to re-emphasize the government's intention to adhere to the terms of the Edmonton commitment. This involves a pledge on our part to increase our transfers to local authorities at the rate of growth of our revenues. This year we have substantially overpaid...

"This action will require some tough choices at the local level. Wage and salary raises and other cost escalations will have to be found from efficiency improvements or increases in local taxes or from program revisions and deletions. I am convinced that belts can be tightened at the local level with no loss of essential services. That must be the responsibility of the locally elected representatives. The buck must stop at every level of government."

Does that not sound familiar? That was in 1975. But let me tell the members of some of the recommendations of that blue-collar or blue-ribbon group. It had Betty Kennedy, Maxwell Henderson, Robert Hurlburt, W. A. B. Anderson, Rendall Dick and James D. Fleck, a name that will bring shudders to some of us. They made hundreds of recommendations. Let me talk about a couple.

Here is 14.25 on page 400 of this report: "The Ontario Energy Corp. not be permitted to invest at this time in any further projects over and above the two projects with which it is currently involved, namely Syncrude and Polar Gas."

Here is the 14.26 recommendation: "The Ontario Energy Corp. not become an active operation but instead restrict itself to acting as a financing vehicle."

There are all kinds of recommendations in here that this government has ignored even though it made its usual great public relations fuss at the time when this document was tabled.

Is it not interesting there were three from the private sector and three people intimately involved with the operation of the provincial government? Mr. Anderson, the members will recall, was the deputy minister at Management Board. He has gone on to his reward in Ottawa. Rendall Dick, of course, we know, and Mr. Fleck was one of the architects of the minority Conservative government in 1975. All presumably were intelligent, knowledgeable people. Yet if one goes through this, one will find that almost none of these recommendations for restraint were followed.

Here we are today, because the government did not act on any of them from 1975 until now, trying presumably to fight inflation and high government spending using the civil service. That is not good enough. We have to have more than that as an economic program for Ontario.

I might say for some of those people who are dozing on the back benches over there that one of the recommendations was to fire all the parliamentary assistants. It is interesting that we know, and Morley Rosenberg amongst others knows, that to the victors go the spoils -- or in some cases, to the losers on the victor's side go the spoils, to rewrite that a little bit.

5:40 p.m.

You, of course, Mr. Speaker, perform a very productive and necessary function around here. But 62 out of 70 on the government side are drawing extra money. If I were Premier and if I were really serious about government restraint, I would look around beside me and behind me and say: "All right, we are going to start in our own backyard. We will show people we really mean business."

I think it was the Minister of Community and Social Services (Mr. Drea) who said, "Self-discipline means sacrifice, and it has to hurt a little." I am sure it hurt the Premier to give up the jet, but we on this side also know he gave up the jet only because the public opinion polls said it is the symbol of a profligate government at this time of restraint. I meant to ask the Minister of Transportation and Communications (Mr. Snow) if the Urban Transportation Development Corp. yacht club had space for a water bomber to land there.

The Acting Speaker: The honourable member is speaking to Bill 179, An Act respecting the Restraint of Compensation in the Public Sector.

Mr. T. P. Reid: I certainly am, Mr. Speaker. We are talking about restraint in the public service. How can the government ask somebody at $15,000 to restrain himself to five per cent when the cabinet and 62 out of 70 of those people are waltzing around as if there is nothing happening in Ontario? I am sure the Treasurer knows better than anyone else that we really have the function here of setting an example.

The credibility of his whole program rests on whether or not the doctors are restricted to five per cent as well, because I am sure he realizes that most people are concerned about equity and the appearance of fairness. If we are in this inflationary fight together, if we are looking down the road for a better, stronger economic Ontario, then we all have to make those sacrifices.

It is not always the money that is important; it is the perception of our standing in the community and just where we stand on the economic ladder. There is a very good book I would recommend to the Treasurer, but perhaps he, like the Minister of Community and Social Services, does not read. It is called The Zero-Sum Society, and it is by an American economist Lester Thurow. In this book he uses the phrase that social scientists use, "relative deprivation." I want to read one paragraph for the edification of the Treasurer:

"What sociologists call relative deprivation is a very real feeling in a liberal democracy. Studies in this area indicate that individuals have a very strong feeling that economic benefits should be proportional to costs -- that is, efforts, hardship, talents and the like -- but that equals should be treated equally. Since there are various types of such costs in any situation and different rewards -- income, esteem, status, power -- the problem immediately arises as to how equals are defined and how proportionality is to be determined." And it goes on.

It is quite an interesting book, because we are dealing with the very things he talks about in the theory of a zero-sum society. Basically what he means by a zero-sum society is that there are always some losers and some winners. When a budget is brought in and the law changed, some people gain and some people lose. He uses the analogy of a sporting event in which there is always a winner and there is always a loser.

He goes on to say that in the 1980s and 1990s to the year 2000 it is going to be increasingly difficult to arrive at how we slice up the pie and who gets what. I tend to agree with that aspect of his thesis. I think it is obvious that for all of us, at whatever level we are, we have to take relatively less. But I hope we will ensure that those on the bottom end of the scale take a lesser amount of less than those at the higher level.

I was going to quote all the figures from the budget and the fact the budgetary estimates are already wrong, but I want to spend a very few minutes repeating that this bill should only be a very small part of an economic recovery program for the province. I hope we will make this bill fairer and more equitable before it passes into law.

I am disappointed this can only be a small part of what has to be a larger program. A couple of school boards, I think it was, are passing bylaws saying, "When this restraint period is over, we are going to catch up. We are going to get the 100 per cent or 200 per cent that we wanted to give ourselves this year."

Nobody can predict the future. If we extrapolate the trend, we cannot say we are in a restraint period for only a year or 15 months and after that all the shackles are off and we can go back to the unrestrained inflation we have seen in the past few years. We have serious economic problems that are not going to go away in a year, a year and a half or two years. We have serious problems sectorially in our economy that are not going to be solved in a year or two. They are not going to go away.

If we do not get inflation under control and come up with the mechanism to keep it down, we really are going to destroy the fabric of this country, along with many others in the world. It bothers me that people are looking in such a short-term fashion at the problems we are trying to deal with here and expecting that they can catch up when all of this is over. That indicates the expectations of what we can afford in this economy are still much too high. Until those expectations come down to a more reasonable level, or one the economy can handle, we are not going to solve this very fundamental problem with which we are faced.

We wait anxiously for the government to come up with some kind of economic program. It seems to me we must make as good a case out of a bad situation as we can. At least we now have the opportunity to be building for when the economy will improve, when the economy of the United States might take off, when demand in the world does increase. We should be laying the groundwork now with an economic strategy for the province so that we will have things in place to take advantage of that. Perhaps the public opinion polls have not told my friends opposite how they can do that yet.

I join with them in saying to the federal government, let us work together on this situation. Let us have some direction. I say also to the Treasurer that his colleagues across this country at the provincial level have been less than unanimous as to what should be done. It is not all the federal government's fault. All of us across this country have to take some of the blame. As the manufacturing heartland of Canada and a province with a large share of the resources, we in Ontario have a duty and a responsibility to do something on our own if action is not forthcoming from the federal government.

5:50 p.m.

We talked in our budget replies about the sectoral problems, high technology, and development. I want only to leave one last thought with the Treasurer. The word "productivity" has been conspicuously absent from all his replies and, if I recall correctly, from his speech and explanation of the bill. No doubt that word will become overworked and will become a cliche in the coming months and years. Nevertheless it is something we have to deal with in our economy.

A few years ago the present Premier was on the verge of setting up a productivity council in Ontario. As I understand it, it was to be a tripartite body with government, management and labour represented. For some reason the Premier, perhaps as a result of the backlash from those who thought he was becoming too socialistic, backed off.

We do not even know for sure how to define productivity, but if we use the numbers used by the Organization of Economic Co-operation and Development, we see that Canada and Ontario have been falling farther and farther behind. At one point in 1979-80 our figure was one half that of some European countries.

This is one of the fundamental problems. It is related to the whole inflationary problem and yet the Treasurer has not addressed the situation at all. The government has not addressed the situation.

He used to be on public accounts. I do not think he was there when we talked about the civil service and merit increases. I am glad to see in the bill itself we are now restraining merit increases for those earning $35,000. I think it was the Treasurer who finally mentioned merit increases in the House today in response to a question. What happened was that civil servants at the management level automatically got merit increases up to six per cent.

I think the Treasurer touched on that, the fact that they would get the same economic increase as members of the Ontario Public Service Employees Union, which would be eight or nine per cent, and then automatically without hardly anybody in this chamber or in the community at large knowing it, they would get this thing called a merit increase, up to an additional six per cent. We learned from the Civil Service Commission there were darned few who did not automatically get it.

How could one argue? Could one argue that one or the other was not worth it? The Civil Service Commission under the aegis of this government did no reporting on the people working for it. There was nothing on anybody's record to say he was a good, bad or indifferent employee. Nothing at all.

It is interesting that was one of the recommendations in the special program review, that all employee records be reviewed. The exact term slips my mind for the moment, but every year there was to be a review of the employee's work and that review would go in that employee's file.

Mr. Wrye: Performance appraisal.

Mr. T. P. Reid: Performance appraisal, thank you. That there be performance appraisals was recommended back in 1975. Only reluctantly and slowly is the government now getting into that.

But these are not the people at the lower end of the scale; these are the management groups who are already well paid. I am glad to see the Treasurer is sufficiently miffed that he is doing away with merit increases in the bill for those who earn more than $35,000. The people in the unions do not get merit increases and I think they are entitled to more consideration than they are getting in this bill.

The special program review talks about setting up a system to increase and improve productivity within the civil service at the provincial level, in agencies, boards and commissions, and at the local level. Again, nothing has been done, lo all these many years. The word has been conspicuously absent from any comments the Treasurer has made.

There are articles one can get from the library called "Government and Productivity" and "Inflation and the Productivity Decline." If any member does not think the two are related, I suggest he read those particular articles.

The level of the management people was $35,000, so I presume anybody earning under $35,000 will still get merit increases. We do not get merit increases and if there was a merit increase for honourable members based on performance, I am afraid very few of us would enjoy such an increase, particularly the cabinet.

Mr. Martel: What about the parliamentary assistants?

Mr. T. P. Reid: Regarding the parliamentary assistants, one cannot rate a performance when nothing is done at all.

We are concerned and waiting anxiously for the Treasurer to come forward with a program of his own to start the rebuilding and renewal of the Ontario economy. I hope to goodness he will not rise in his place or have his parliamentary assistant do so and say, "We have this great scheme, it is called the Board of Industrial Leadership and Development." It is called bilge, that is what it is called.

The second to last press release from bilge was that the BILD program was granting the northern regional library system a $30,000 grant for the next year.

Mr. Piché: BILD has been good for Sudbury.

Mr. T. P. Reid: We are taking it in Rainy River as well, but what has the regional library system really got to do with BILD?

Mr. Martel: Are they not building a new library?

Mr. T. P. Reid: They are not building a new library, not at all. They are so hard up for a justification for these programs, and this one in particular, that they have to send out their press releases to keep all those people busy. I wanted to speak at some length about all the public relations people, but I will save that for another time.

Mr. Wrye: Well, eight o'clock.

Mr. T. P. Reid: Would the members like me to come back?

[Applause]

Mr. T. P. Reid: Mr. Speaker, what can I do with that overwhelming support?

The Acting Speaker: I can only suggest that you watch the clock as we are close to the time.

Mr. T. P. Reid: Would you like me to adjourn the debate at this moment?

The Acting Speaker: May I suggest to the honourable member that, it being close to six of the clock, I will leave the chair and return at eight o'clock this evening.

The House recessed at 6 p.m.

28 septembre 1982