Assemblée législative de l'Ontario

REPORTS, STANDING COMMITTEE ON PROCEDURAL AFFAIRS (CONTINUED)

REPORT, SELECT COMMITTEE ON THE OMBUDSMAN (CONTINUED)

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The House resumed at 8 p.m.

REPORTS, STANDING COMMITTEE ON PROCEDURAL AFFAIRS (CONTINUED)

Resuming the adjourned debate on the motion for adoption of the recommendations contained in the report of the standing committee on procedural affairs on agencies, boards and commissions (No. 7).

Resuming the adjourned debate on the motion for adoption of the recommendations contained in the report of the standing committee on procedural affairs on agencies, boards and commissions (No. 8).

Mr. Mancini: Mr. Speaker, when we adjourned a week ago I was wrapping up my comments concerning the work of the procedural affairs committee. I dwelled for some time on the Ontario government's crown corporation, Innovation Development for Employment Advancement. As we all remember, this crown corporation was put in place shortly before the 1981 election to give the people of Ontario the illusion that the government was actually going to do something if it received a new mandate. IDEA Corp. was part of the whole Board of Industrial Leadership and Development scenario which was to be the pool, not only for new ideas, but also for obtaining and preparing money to move Ontario forward in the high-technology industry.

When I was making my remarks to the Legislature, I said how impressed I was by the crown corporation's first president, Brian St. John. Only a few days after that, Brian St. John and the government of Ontario parted company. I certainly hope that a compliment from the opposition did not have anything to do with Mr. St. John's departure. I do not suspect it did. I suspect it had more to do to with his aggressiveness in wanting to get things done and with the stale, tired ways of this government, which believes in more promotion, more public relations and more government advertising. It does not want anybody around who is actually going to do a lot of work and maybe get things done.

Those are my own personal ideas. It is not funny I used that word. I am sorry to see Mr. St. John go. I believed him to be a hardworking and competent person.

I want to take five minutes to read to the House a report that appeared in a daily newspaper published here in Toronto only a few days ago. The only reason I read this report is that it is so relevant to the discussion we have been having, and I think all members will be interested. It starts out by saying:

"IDEA Corp., the flagship of Ontario's efforts to catch up to the era of high tech, appears to be foundering before ever really setting sail.

"IDEA's first president, Brian St. John, leaves today in what he says was a mutual agreement to part company. The government is paying St. John a year's salary -- $115,000 -- for the severance.

"'We didn't always see eye to eye and we chose to go separate ways,' says Industry Minister Frank Miller, to whom IDEA reports."

Just to stop there for a minute, that is the kind of statement we have come to expect from Conservative cabinet ministers when they pay such funds for severance pay, when we see a major part of the government's high-tech push floundering around. That is the kind of statement we have come to expect from the cabinet ministers. They did not see eye to eye and there is really nothing going on. We are very disappointed by that.

To continue: "High hopes surrounded St. John when he was hired by IDEA's provincially appointed board a little over two years ago. He holds a doctoral degree in oceanography, had experience in a publicly owned corporation as a former senior adviser on environmental affairs for Petro-Canada and was a former president of a technological venture subsidiary of the Teck mining corporation.

"But today IDEA is left with a major gap at the top and facing serious questions about whether it can yet fulfil its mandate.

"While the search for a new president goes on, IDEA's chairman, Ian Macdonald, former president of York University and former Deputy Treasurer of Ontario, says he will 'hold the fort.' But Macdonald has teaching duties at York. He also is chairman of the provincial inquiry into the financing of elementary and secondary education and he sits on the boards of several major corporations.

"At any rate, Macdonald's reputation is as a manager, not as the type of real world businessman that IDEA now needs to turn things around.

"The IDEA story is difficult to unravel because no one seems precisely sure just what is going wrong. One bottom line is clear enough: IDEA cost the taxpayers almost $4 million last year, most of that operating costs, but almost $800,000 in losses due to collapsing ventures.

"On the other hand, Macdonald says, other investments now are coming on line and IDEA still may be able to meet its legislated obligation to become self-financing in five years. 'The long gestation is past and we have a lot more on the drawing board,' he says.

8:10 p.m.

"IDEA originally was part of the Progressive Conservatives' 1981 election platform -- the BILD program of economic development for the decade. As part of BILD, technology centres were established to assist the auto parts, microelectronics, robotics and biotechnology industries. At the apex of this network was IDEA, financed with $107 million to promote early development of new technologies, act as a catalyst bringing new ideas together with industry and increase the supply of skilled manpower."

We know we are short some 70,000 positions as far as skilled manpower is concerned.

"IDEA's enabling legislation passed in October 1981. The board was appointed in March 1982. St. John became president in August 1982, and a business plan for future operations was passed by the cabinet ministers who ran BILD in January 1983.

"It was not many months before the flamboyant style at the top of IDEA began irritating senior people in government. The search for St. John and the vice-presidents" -- and I know my colleague the member for Essex North (Mr. Ruston) will be very interested in hearing this -- "was conducted by a headhunting firm at a cost of $250,000." That is a lot of money to throw around. This government has a lot of money.

Mr. Ruston: That is a quarter of a million dollars.

Mr. Mancini: Yes, it was $250,000.

"St. John was paid a salary that topped the Premier's." Of course, that is nothing. There are many public servants in the employ of this government who make more money than the Premier (Mr. Davis). The head of pretty well every crown corporation in this province under the jurisdiction of this government makes more money than the Premier. We are not telling anyone new news.

I am sure Mr. Mulroney will take care of things as soon as he has a chance. We will find out what he does. One thing that we have seen Mr. Mulroney do is change the name from executive assistant to chief of staff and therefore be able to raise wages by $40,000. That was really a neat trick, but I do not think he will be able to explain that to the taxpayers probably in the fashion he would like to.

It cost $250,000 to find Mr. St. John and his vice-presidents. Then we found out, to continue, "Boardroom chairs in IDEA's headquarters at the bottom of Yonge Street are rumoured to have cost $2,000 each." They are probably more comfortable than even your chair, Mr. Speaker.

"The style added to the doubts that Miller and Larry Grossman developed over what IDEA was doing with its mandate."

This is where I find the article somewhat objectionable. This style caused the Minister of Industry and Trade (Mr. F. S. Miller) and the Treasurer (Mr. Grossman) to have some doubts. Frankly, I do not accept that. We have other crown corporations in this province under the jurisdiction of this government that are far more flamboyant and willing to spend the money of the taxpayers than IDEA Corp. has ever been, but we never seem to hear about those particular crown corporations from the Minister of Industry and Trade or the Treasurer.

My colleague reminds me of the Ontario Waste Management Corp. which has a highly paid chairman. It also is very favourable towards comfortable chairs. I am told it paid somewhere between $800 to $1,000 for the chairs it uses in its boardroom.

Mr. Newman: How much did ours cost?

Mr. Mancini: That is a good question.

We are all aware of the Ontario Energy Corp. and that we had to buy $650 million worth of an oil company just so Malcolm Rowan would have a job to go to. That is really flamboyant. If we want to talk about things being flamboyant, that is probably the most flamboyant thing this government and any of its crown corporations have ever done.

Anyway, these few interesting facts that have been revealed about the IDEA Corp. point not so much to the failure of Mr. St. John in trying to carry out the government's mandate, but I suspect point more to the government's failure to explain to Mr. St. John exactly what it wanted of him and exactly how he was to carry out his responsibilities and how he was to raise this money.

I do not see anywhere any evidence of the Minister of Industry and Trade, or the Treasurer in particular, using their clout to obtain firms interested in creating large pools of money for the creation of new technology. If anyone at all should have influence, surely it should be the Treasurer of Ontario.

I am told that when the Treasurer of Ontario was the Minister of Industry and Trade he had very lengthy lists of all the corporations in Ontario and some of the smaller companies. Some people say he created these lists so he could tap them for financial contributions for his election campaign. Frankly, I do not believe that.

I believe he created these lists, or they already were available, so the government of Ontario could keep track of exactly what was going on in different sectors of the economy. With that information already available, and then with the creation of the IDEA Corp., it should not have been very difficult for the government to use its huge clout, its $25 billion a year interest in our economy here in Ontario, to encourage investors to create significant pools of money to bring forward new technology.

New technology in the agricultural industry is greatly needed. New technology in the auto parts industry is needed. I could go on and name other sectors. That has not happened. The government has now let the president of IDEA Corp. go with the very flimsy explanation given by the Minister of Industry and Trade. He stated, "We did not always see eye to eye and we chose to go separate ways." When we realize that Mr. St. John was able to obtain a very lucrative settlement, we have to wonder under what terms Mr. St. John did leave the presidency of this company.

I was able to take quite a bit of the Legislature's time last week when we were discussing the matters that came before the standing committee on procedural affairs. I certainly do not want to take any time repeating what I said last week. I just want to say I know one of the reasons the Legislature is jam-packed tonight and all the members are here is that they have always found the reports of the standing committee on procedural affairs to be very thoughtful, very precise and in most cases very nonpolitical.

I will end my remarks with those comments, and I am very glad to await the comments of my friend the member for Oshawa (Mr. Breaugh).

Mr. Breaugh: Mr. Speaker, I appreciate having the opportunity to make some remarks on these two reports of the standing committee on procedural affairs. It is an interesting exercise to go through these agency reviews. I am an advocate of the concept that probably the best thing we do is notify them that we are going to review them. That in itself brings about an awareness that they are agencies of the government of Ontario, that they do operate on taxpayers' money and that they do have a mandate and a job to do.

We are beginning to encounter in the committee a bit of a problem. Very simply, there are some of us who look at agencies of the government that are not very active and do not do very much. Then we run into some difficulty with other members of the committee who say, "They do not do anything, but they do not do any harm either, so let them go." We have had some interesting discussions in the committee in the last little while over agencies that, it is pretty clear to us, have not done very much in the last year or so, have met maybe once in two years and do not have a great jurisdiction.

It is pretty clear to me that there is not a crying need to have agencies like that. The recurring argument seems to be that because they do not do any harm they should continue in operation. I am not an advocate of that. If we have agencies with a mandate, they ought to be doing something. The fact that they are not doing anybody any harm is hardly an argument to continue their existence. I know there is a political reason for keeping them in place, but it is not quite right to have an agency of the province that has allegedly something or other to do with agriculture and never has to meet, never has to do anything, but just has to be there for ever and a day.

8:20 p.m.

I want to pick out a few of the agencies tonight, and I should note in passing that this committee in a public way has reviewed slightly more than 60 agencies of the government, which is more public review than those agencies have ever had in their lives.

While there are not exactly a lot of strident recommendations contained in these two reports, at least a committee of the Legislature has taken the time to review the workings of an agency and has offered the agency an opportunity to come to Queen's Park and tell the members of the Legislature what it is doing. We have had the opportunity on a few occasions to visit agencies when they actually run a facility such as a bridge, a park or whatever. We have had a brief opportunity to see that side of the agenda.

I make reference to the seventh report initially because there are some agencies that deserve mention. The first is an old hobby-horse of mine, the Criminal Injuries Compensation Board. I am constantly perplexed by the notion that in this society there is virtually no limit to the amount of money we will spend to incarcerate somebody. The judicial system seems to operate without an adding machine of any kind. It is even wrong to ask the question, "How much will this trial cost?" It is all somehow beyond the territory of proper scrutiny. However, when it comes to providing some funding for people who are injured in the course of a crime, the budget gets tight.

The members of the committee were struck by the fact that there are people suffering serious injuries because of some criminal activity who are getting rather picayune assessments from the board. The board made its usual argument that it only gets so much money and that there is only so much to go around. Those who suffer injury because of criminal activity may only get token awards, but the only reason they are token is that there is no more money in the till.

We hear this argument every time we deal with somebody who is poor, with an injured worker or with a single-parent family. The restraint system seems to apply immensely well, neatly and tightly, to everybody who falls in those categories. I am afraid I have to add that anybody who has been to the Criminal Injuries Compensation Board is faced with the same restraint.

During the course of the hearings, the committee came across some things the members perhaps had not thought about; for example, all the anguish a family suffers when there is a rape or a murder in a family. There is all the mental anguish and real physical pain. There is all the expense to the family having to do with lawyers, medical care, psychiatric treatment, adjustment and loss of income, virtually none of which is recognized by the Criminal Injuries Compensation Board.

One of the things we talked about a great deal, and it is in the report, is that this concept has to be given a great deal more attention by both the federal government and the province. This may sound a bit unfair, but oddly enough when Ontario wanted to hold a seminar on victims of crime, when it was deemed to be appropriate for the government to hold a seminar of that kind, it went over to the Sutton Place Hotel and had what I am told was a rather grand bash.

The members who know me know that I have absolutely nothing against grand bashes. I rather like them. However, it seems to me to be totally inappropriate when one is discussing something such as this, and admitting as was so evident before the committee that this government feels it cannot afford to pay adequate compensation to victims of crime, to go over to the Sutton Place and host a great conference on the victims of crime. That conference could have been held a block nearer here at much less expense. However, that seems to be the way of the world these days.

One of the things this review exercise does for the members is that if you do not happen to have an interest in an area that is served by one of these agencies, it is a bit of an eye-opener. You find out who these people are. You find out what the father of the Treasurer, for example, is doing these days, how much he gets paid and all of that.

When you get down to the actual work of the agency, you also find that the compensation offered by the Criminal Injuries Compensation Board is getting better but still nowhere meets the need. There are whole classifications of compensation that should be paid, and we all admit they should be paid, but there is not much more than passing sympathy for those families.

It is difficult. Having had some personal experience in dealing with families that have been disrupted because of some criminal activity, I know they are tough people to deal with. They are angry at the world; they are mad; they are not always the most rational people. But then again, they and their families have been dragged through our whole judicial system, usually involving the loss of the life, for example, of a son or a daughter in the family. That is a terrible experience for a family to have to go through, and added to that is the tremendous financial impact it has on the victim of the crime.

More and more I am coming around to the point of view that if we cannot do it the way I want to have it done, at least we ought to spend as much money on the victims of the crime as we do on the criminals themselves. It seems to me that would be a fair balance.

In this report there is one other interesting little agency before us, a little group of folks called the Law Society of Upper Canada, which some of us refer to as the most powerful union in the country. This group, at least initially, was not very sure it wanted to appear before a committee of the Ontario Legislature; it felt somehow this was not proper and it did not have to report to us.

A few letters were exchanged and the Law Society of Upper Canada did appear. Quite frankly, I do not think it found it to be a mean and vindictive experience. I think it found that there was an exchange of views. It did not accept all the recommendations of the committee, but I think it saw the law society's role in life in a somewhat different way from the way members of the committee did, and I think that was fair.

The member for Durham East (Mr. Cureatz) rather tore a strip off them from time to time, which is probably refreshing for them, but I did not notice anybody bleeding too badly as he went out the door. It seemed to me the group was intact and responded to our recommendations in a way in which it saw fit.

We also reviewed the Ontario Cancer Treatment and Research Foundation. I think these recommendations are interesting because they reflect the difference between a committee of the Legislature looking at an agency and the agency talking about its own duties. I think in our own gentle way we pointed out that there are other considerations you have to think about when you set up an agency like that.

We are all in favour of cancer treatment; there is no question about that. I think we did manage to bring to light some concerns we had as members from different parts of Ontario. The foundation was not saying no to it, it just had not thought about it before; so it was a useful exchange from that standpoint.

The last two agencies are the interesting ones, because the contrast between them is quite startling. The first one is an agency of the government called the Ontario Manpower Commission. When it came before us, I was quite impressed with its personnel, Dr. Wilson and his staff, the kind of reports it did with the kind of resources it has, its place in government and its contact with all the other ministries. Here was Ontario creating an agency that had a lot going for it: a lot of power, a lot of momentum and all the contacts in the world.

The only question I had at the end was about what good it does. At the end of all its work, in which it projects where the jobs will be, where the need will be in the marketplace, what kind of training has to be done, what you do after you create a product and all that kind of stuff in terms of what the manpower needs really will be -- we had an interesting discussion about whether it should be "manpower," "personpower" or whatever -- the only shoe that is missing is the final one: how does this connect with the government's policy?

After the manpower commission lays out all the studies about how one should train people, how does it make any real difference in the way things are done around here? In other words, how do you go from the theoretical study done by the manpower commission to the actual need, which is probably carried out in community colleges, universities or secondary schools? There were some problems there.

8:30 p.m.

The contrast was with the Ontario Status of Women Council, which came in during the same review. There was the Ontario Manpower Commission, with the resources to do its job, with a fairly substantial salary for the person who chairs the commission full-time and with a big board of reference from labour, management, technical people and all that. Then there was the Ontario Status of Women Council, with a part-time position. At that time Sally Barnes was chairing the council. Shortly thereafter, she decided to pack it in. A bit of conflict was developing between the new Minister responsible for Women's Issues (Mr. Welch) and the personnel there.

It was an agency that had none of those resources and certainly could have been very useful to the government, to the Legislature and to women in Ontario by establishing backup information on such things as equal pay for work of equal value. It very much wanted to do that kind of thing, but it did not have the resources. It met occasionally on a part-time basis and had a few staff people.

There was a stark comparison between the two agencies, with one being given a kind of preferred status. In that case, it was: "Spare no expense. Get the job done. Hire as many people as you need." There was a little problem with the publishing of reports the government did not want published, but eventually even they got out. Then there was the Ontario Status of Women Council, almost reflecting that the government was not too happy about this. It would like to have these women meet once in a while, but not often enough ever to cause anybody any difficulty.

The contrast between the two agencies was quite remarkable.

I want to move to the eighth report. I want to point to one case where we actually did manage to convince everybody that an agency ought to be sunsetted when we talked about the Board of Visitors of Homewood Sanitarium, Guelph. By the end of that exercise I think we had convinced just about everybody involved that there was no need for that agency and that everything it did could be handled in a slightly different way.

We went through the Ontario Board of Parole. It was another interesting one. One of the things the agency review does fairly well is provide people with a forum to say what they think is right and wrong about what their agency does. When we did the Ontario Board of Parole, a lot of little conflicts erupted, pointing out rather nicely that it is awkward to have a parole board functioning in a ministry that has a lot of other things in its hopper, so that the parole board has to compete for such things as access to computer time, access to records and clerks to fill out the records. There are day-by-day practical problems and then there are conflict of interest problems. It is awkward to have it in that ministry, and we made a recommendation that it be switched to a different ministry.

In the course of that, we discovered there were some problems with such things as day passes and temporary absence programs. There is at least a potential that something which starts out as a good idea, such as a temporary absence program, can turn out to be a revolving-door process. Many of us are concerned that our judicial system does not always do its job the way we think it ought to be done or that things are pretty loose when we get down to the prison system, the parole system and the temporary absence program.

Perhaps there is a bit of an explanation there as to precisely why things are going a little amiss in our society. We trust that Solicitors General, Attorneys General, Ministers of Correctional Services and all those people have a tight hand on all this and that the rules are clearly spelled out. We found out that they are not.

Something like a temporary absence program has lots of loopholes in it. People can be sentenced to jail by a court, move into the jail and someone in the jail -- we were not quite able to determine exactly who that was -- can overrule the workings of a court. The judge can say, "I sentence this person to 16 months in one of our institutions." He goes off there and some person who is faceless and nameless, a bureaucrat at the jail, can say: "We are going to put you out on a temporary absence program. You can sign in once a day, or we may make you come back here and stay during the evening, but we are going to put you out on the street again."

It seemed to me that we had an agency of the government working at cross-purposes with the whole judicial process. There is not much encouragement to sort that out, because I do not suppose the judge has the opportunity to follow up on what happens to everybody he has sentenced. He probably assumes that when he sends people off to jail, they stay in jail. Of course, that is not true at all. Nor is it true that if you are denied one of those temporary absences there is much of an appeal process. They are not breaking rules, because there are no rules. We expressed some concern about that. There was a bit of discussion in the Legislature about it. I am not sure the problem was resolved but at least it came to light.

We went through a number of review boards and hearing boards in this report. There was the Social Assistance Review Board, where we were impressed with the number of problems it had and the way it was trying to sort out those problems.

We went through the Game and Fish Hearing Board, which we discovered was an interesting exercise, because it is a board that is set up to hear things but not to make decisions. It is a little difficult to understand how a board could be set up to hear problems around game and fish regulations but not to let it make decisions. The decisions are made by the minister, who was not there to hear the case in the first place. It is an interesting situation.

It is like having one group be the judge and sit in court to hear all the evidence, but the jury is not present; then the jury comes in six months later and makes the decision. It is hard to figure out how it does it. None the less, although there was a bit of an attempt to sunset the Game and Fish Hearing Board, a problem occurred around fishing quotas and licences and therefore it was not possible to do that.

We also looked at the Nursing Homes Review Board. It is a little hard to figure out that one. It is chaired by Peter Magda, a fellow from Oshawa whom I happen to know. I know how Peter Magda got appointed chairman of that one because I know who Peter Magda is. He is a very nice, young, Tory lawyer in Oshawa. He seems to have at least two or three of the required qualifications to hold a job like that.

It was interesting because it was a review board that apparently did not have very much to review. In the course of our deliberations, the committee pointed out that there are lots of things about nursing homes that need to be reviewed, such as the quality of care. If one has a complaint, how does one do that? How does the dispute get mediated? It is beyond the board's jurisdiction; it only reviews the licences of these places. We pointed out some things that we, as members of the Legislature, thought ought to be reviewed. We made some recommendations about that.

We went through the Crop Insurance Commission of Ontario, which was very interesting. I suppose it was a lesson for those of us who are not rural members and who do not have a working knowledge of crop insurance. Again, if I may say so, it is one of the agencies which has almost sacred status, at least with the members who are from rural constituencies. That probably means it does some good for some people, which is not to say it is perfect.

There are some matters I want to talk about in somewhat more depth. One of them is the next one on the list. It is the Alcoholism and Drug Addiction Research Foundation. For a long time now, I have had little axes to grind with these folks. It is not that I am against the kind of research work they have done, because I am not.

I am going to give the committee full marks for credit. I brought up my concerns about how certain press releases are put out by the addiction research people; how I thought they clearly knew the information they were putting out was not inaccurate but could be -- how shall I phrase this? -- misinterpreted by those who might be a little overzealous to write the hot news story of the day.

During the course of our discussions in the committee hearings and subsequently, people from the addiction research foundation took the time to come to chat with me about some of the problems they had in putting out this information. They have used a slightly different format, or at least have made the attempt. When the addiction research foundation puts out news releases these days, the attempt is being made to provide enough background information so the information is not only accurate as put out but also will be interpreted accurately by those who write news stories about them.

Perhaps the work of the Alcoholism and Drug Addiction Research Foundation will be a little bit better because somebody took the time to raise a complaint with them and they took the time and effort to deal with that complaint in a nice, calm, rational way.

8:40 p.m.

I want to make a couple other remarks about addiction research because I have received some letters about some of the recommendations, and I think some other members have too. There have been lots of people studying addiction research for quite a while now. Not all the studies that have been done on addiction research have been completely implemented or given the papal seal, so to speak, by the ministry. However, I think they are aware that, like most of the agencies, for a long time now they have had several problems around money.

The addiction research foundation is trying to do a lot of things. It has a very ambitious schedule. The consultants who studied its structure, and I am sure its internal people and certainly the committee, noted it is pretty hard trying to do all those things at the same time. There was a consensus among committee members that perhaps it was time for the addiction research foundation to focus a little more clearly on what its role was because it really does a multitude of things.

The people here in Toronto are doing research and have developed and maintained a worldwide reputation for good research in that field and they publish information extensively. Sometimes I quarrel with the way they publish it and sometimes I quarrel with the results of their research, but I give them full marks for having developed that reputation and maintained it.

They also do a great deal of field work and they have a series of regional offices around Ontario. The committee was concerned, and some members of the committee were downright agitated, about the regional offices of the addiction research people. I do not share that concern, but to be fair about it, to put it on the record, the concern was raised in the committee during the course of the hearings.

The addiction research people had an opportunity during the committee hearings, and subsequently, to put another side to the argument, to say they need regional offices. I sat through the hearings and my assessment may be a little bit harsh, but I think it is fair. They had the opportunity to defend the system of regional offices and I did not hear them doing that very well.

There were lots of brochures at the back. We were asking them: "What do the regional offices do? What kind of function is performed there? Are you performing a function that is not performed by anybody else in your community?" The addiction research people did not put up a very spirited defence, to be polite about it.

In the end, the committee's recommendation on that was to refocus again, along the line of the consultant's report done on the addiction research foundation. The committee's recommendation, in essence, is to focus on the research part. We all came to the consensus that this is what they do well and that should be their prime focus. Perhaps the responsibility for starting up new programs, servicing people with various problems in communities, ought to be phased out by the addiction research foundation and done by staff people and programs run by other agencies.

One of the things we recognize in most of our communities, for example, is it really does not matter what the topic is, whether one is talking about cigarette smoking, drug abuse, alcoholism, stress problems, child abuse or any of the social problems that are around, if we want to restrict it to things that might be solely the domain of the addiction research foundation, that is not hard to do. There are lots of agencies out there pumping out information, setting up new programs, bringing them back in.

One of the things that concerns me no end is that I have lots of agencies with good ideas and no money. It seems to me, as we go through this process of trying to get them established, we are having a very difficult time getting them on a solid financial basis. I think in part that has been an ongoing problem at the addiction research foundation, and the committee tried to address that.

What concerns me a little bit is that the review was done some time ago and the report has been out for some time. I am getting letters now saying somebody wants to shut down all the regional offices. I did not hear the committee say that. I know there were individuals, such as the member for Essex South (Mr. Mancini), who were a little adamant on this point. I do not want to misquote him, but he certainly had a lot more concerns about regional offices than I did and I think than most of the members of the committee had.

The committee in its recommendation did not say, "Shut them all down, fire all the people and do away with that." The committee addressed itself to the problem of duplication. The committee sat in session and listened for the addiction research people to make their case to keep their regional operations going. I did not hear a very good case being made. So we did make a recommendation that I suppose members could say lends itself to being interpreted in that way.

Let me read the recommendation. "The Ministry of Health and the district health councils accept responsibility for ensuring the provision of alcohol and drug treatment services in local communities, and that the foundation phase out its local or regional offices."

There is a lot of latitude there. It is hardly one of our basic, black and white, "shut 'em down and put 'em out of business" statements. It raises the concern, which I think is legitimate, that there is some duplication out there. There would be nothing wrong with that if we could fund all those duplicate services, but we cannot. It would be fine if they were all doing a good job that could be put together on a co-ordinated basis and they could all survive, but that is not happening.

I think the committee looked fairly at what we saw as a problem in our own communities, the problem with the Alcoholism and Drug Addiction Research Foundation around funding. It said somebody is going to have to get this in sharper focus; somebody is going to have to make some decisions.

We noted with some concern that things such as health councils are in the same boat. I still support the concept of the district health councils; they were put in place to co-ordinate this kind of work, to gather and disseminate information, to provide services and to identify where there is a need.

The plain fact of life is that if there were no addiction research regional offices a lot of detoxification centres, for example, would never have started and a lot of programs for drug rehabilitation would never have started.

There are crying needs in many communities. In mine, for example, which is probably one of the most organized communities one would find in Ontario, most of the social needs of the community have been identified. One will find some group somewhere in my community trying to address itself to that problem.

The ones we get under way live hand to mouth trying to get their financial houses in order. Most of them are scrambling now for contracts with one of the ministries for bed services so they can allocate six beds in a hostel to the Ministry of Community and Social Services. Getting a contract to do that solves part of their financial problem in the short term, but they do not have any long-term funding. We have to sort all these priorities out and begin to fund these things properly.

I am sure people from the Oshawa office of the foundation would tell us quickly there is one thing we do not have in Oshawa that has to do with addiction. We have a place called Destiny Manor, where women who have alcoholism problems can go on the way back, a kind of rehabilitation program. We have a place for battered women. We have a detoxification centre for men, but we do not have a detoxification facility for women. We do it in a makeshift way, but we do not have a facility designed to resolve that problem. There is a need there.

In many of our communities we have pretty serious drug problems. We do not have a good handle on how serious they are in our high schools. I do not think we have a good reporting mechanism. I know we do not have really good rehabilitation programs, but we are aware of that.

The sad fact is that in a theoretical way, the regional offices of addiction research could be cut off tomorrow and many of us as members would probably not even know what happened. As it happens, I know the personnel who work in my regional office, so they would probably be on the phone to me tomorrow morning.

The difficulty is there would be a vacancy in my community right away. There would be no one there to provide that kind of service. In our recommendations we say, first, before we talk about phasing out these regional offices or doing anything such as that, we must see that the function is fulfilled.

It would not hurt me in the least if everybody at addiction research said, "It is very nice for the procedural affairs committee to recommend the phasing out of those regional offices, but no one else is in place to do the dirty deed, to do the work on the ground."

I have not heard the Ministry of Health, the district health councils, the Ministry of Community and Social Services or any other body say it is prepared to take up that role in various communities.

It is the kind of recommendation that in hindsight we may have worded in a slightly different way so as not to hurt people's feelings. Then again, I am an advocate of the idea that if one does not say something once in a while one will never hurt anybody's feelings, but one will never get anything done either. Maybe a lot of harm has not been done.

I noticed the Minister of Health (Mr. Norton) has not acted on this or any other recommendation. He has not acted in a formal way on the task force recommendations on the addiction research foundation and how it should be organized. There certainly is lots of room for interpretation and for discussion.

I do not think anyone on the committee took the position that we absolutely chop off the regional offices. There were some members more agitated than I about the functioning or nonfunctioning of the regional offices, but I did not hear anybody get to that extreme.

8:50 p.m.

There is one other area I want to concentrate on tonight, that is some problems we ran into when we reviewed the Innovation Development for Employment Advancement Corp., or IDEA Corp. I am not upset over how much the chairs cost. I would like to have one of those chairs. I would sell it and buy five poor people a good chair, one that did not cost more than a couple of hundred bucks.

What is of more concern to me is that this corporation, like a number of other ideas, needs to be scrutinized a little more carefully than it is, a little more regularly; perhaps by us, perhaps by another committee of the Legislature. There are a lot of them being cranked up from time to time. To be fair and honest, and no one will be shocked by this, there are a lot of agencies being cranked up around election time here in Ontario. When they are announced they are wonderful things; we all know that. They will create thousands of jobs; we all know that.

They will produce shiny brochures such as the one put out by the IDEA Corp. I am a little shocked by the colour of this brochure, which is a deep Tory blue with silver. I am not sure that it is actual silver, but it sure looks like actual silver used for printing.

It was an interesting review. The committee had an opportunity to be entertained by Brian St. John, who has been president of the IDEA Corp. He certainly could sell one an Edsel on a cold winter day. The gentleman in question knew his stuff. Ian Macdonald is the chairman and he knows his stuff. Many of us know him from other jobs he has taken on for the government of Ontario. In other words, we had some prime beef there. These people know what they are doing.

They sure know how to spend money. It turns out that after about three years of -- we really do not know what -- but three years passed between the great announcement and the actual production of something we could identify as an IDEA Corp. We really did not get much of an explanation of what the IDEA Corp. is all about.

We got a real neat slide show, for which we should all be immensely grateful. We got a good outline of how it is set up. We got rather less than a total outline of how it spent all the money it has spent so far. I was not left with a clear impression that a great many jobs had been created by the IDEA Corp. I was left with the impression we should all hope, having spent that kind of money, some day that will come true.

We ran into an interesting snag as we went through this, because there is an unusual mix at work here. The IDEA Corp. takes people's tax dollars and works them over into the private sector. Many of us on the committee, myself particularly on this one, thought, "Wait a minute, this is using tax dollars in a way that subsidizes the private sector." What intrigued me about it, of course, is that this is corporate socialism. This is using tax dollars to develop the private sector.

Mr. Gordon: Socialism.

Mr. Breaugh: Yes, socialism; right.

The difficulty is that normally when we took tax dollars and put then into some agency of the government, we would say: "Okay, but now you will have to be accountable to the public. You will have to come before a public accounts committee or a committee of the Legislature. You will have to publish an annual report and show everybody exactly how you spend all these tax dollars."

When we got into the IDEA Corp., however, we ran very quickly into an impasse, because the IDEA Corp. puts money into private sector companies and joint venture companies with private and public funds in them. It had entered into agreements, because it is in fields of new technology, where if one publishes all the wonderful things one is developing one loses the corporate advantage when they become public knowledge. Anybody could read one's report and run out and make the new widget and make millions of dollars before someone else does.

We came into some conflict in the committee, because I am an advocate of the view that any time one uses tax dollars one ought to be accountable and the people have a right to know how those tax dollars have been spent.

For example, if one looks at the annual report of the IDEA Corp., one will see we are not talking small potatoes here. The funding that is going into these corporations is on the large side. The potential for further funding under this same technique is immense because we are talking for the most part about high-tech products, which are not cheap to produce. They are high risk in most instances. It is going to cost millions of dollars to put a product on the market without ever being really sure of very much in return.

We do not have much knowledge of what other IDEA corporations -- or whatever they are called -- do in Japan, Germany, France, the United States or Great Britain, but there is the opportunity here at the very least to lose a potful on this kind of concept, and I found Mr. St. John and Mr. Macdonald refreshingly frank on this point. There is a clear conflict of interest when one takes public money and socks it into the private sector. It is not clear who knows how this money is being spent and what is really being developed because, of course, there is corporate secrecy here. For their own reasons in the corporate world they do not want to tell people their business, and I understand that.

I do not think the committee really resolved that conflict. We explored it slightly; we explored the idea. For example, we were asking questions in the committee, and in a very polite way Mr. Macdonald and Mr. St. John said. "We cannot tell you that." Of course, normally when a legislative committee runs into somebody who is testifying as a witness who says, "I cannot tell you that," or "I will not tell you that," or "I do not want to tell you that," or "It is part of our agreement that you cannot be told that information," legislative committees tend to get a little huffy and start talking about Speaker's warrants and about making people appear under oath before them.

But there is a question there that must be addressed at some point, because this is all the rage these days. I do not care whether you are a Tory, a Socialist or even a Liberal -- there are 40 of those in the country, I am told -- whatever stripe you are, the current rage in politics in the world is this kind of joint venture activity: joint venture within Ontario, across Canada, around the world; and we have subsequently reviewed other agencies that are expanding this.

There are a couple of cautions I would like to put on all of this. I think the issue of what we called in our report legislative access to information has to be explored. I know there will be a commitment to this IDEA concept and to whatever it will be called for its inception in the next election; I have no doubt that more IDEAs will be put forward during the course of the next election campaign, that more things of this nature will be set up.

One of the problems when the Premier or whoever cranks up the election machinery and cranks out the promises about how they will create jobs does so, is that, after the election, somebody has to figure out what these agencies are supposed to do. It was pretty clear with the IDEA Corp. that it took about three years to figure out exactly what the IDEA Corp. was going to be. It did not know; the government did not know; nobody knew.

The next stage of the problem is that when one actually gets to the point where one hands out money and enters into agreements with the private sector on joint ventures, the first major problem is that there is no accountability to the members of this Legislature.

As I tried to put it in committee, the problem is that I cannot win in this one. If I go back to my constituency and somebody asks, "Did you review the IDEA Corp.?" I say, "Oh yes, we did." "How does it spend its money?" I am supposed to say, "I cannot tell you that, because I do not know." He says, "You dummy, did you not even ask?" I say: "Yes, I asked, but people at the IDEA Corp. said they cannot tell me; they will not tell me. They have signed an agreement with somebody in the private sector that says it is going to be done secretly."

The real problem is that I cannot fulfil my duty as an elected member of the Legislature, supposedly perusing the activities of the IDEA Corp., if I accept the notion that it can enter into agreements that are private. If it wants to use its own money, that is fine; no problem there. But it is not; it is using tax dollars to enter into agreements that require secrecy, and there is not really a good way to cut this type of expenditure.

When we think back in recent history even, about how governments react in this situation, we have never done this before -- at least not very much. For the most part this kind of conflict usually had to do with war efforts, and the secrecy factor was understandable to everybody. We entered into some agreement to build a munitions factory and we were not going to tell our enemies what kind of bombs we were making, where the munitions factory was, how much it was going to cost, how many people it would employ or what kind of new technology it was utilizing at that moment.

9 p.m.

But there is a recommendation in this report to which I think we will be paying more and more attention as the year goes on, which is very simply that the concepts that are put forward in the IDEA Corp. around entering into joint ventures and private sector funding with public money are in direct conflict with legislative accountability. We did not resolve it in the committee and I vowed to chase it around the block several more times as we go through other agency reviews, but it is a very complicated one.

I am the first to admit that in this kind of activity, to look at the kind of high-technology work it is doing, it is not possible to say, "Well, we will have them publish all the information about the new product they are developing." That would certainly destroy any potential they had to put that product on the market except at great losses. In other words, it would be asking the public once again totally to subsidize the research part of this at a time when some of that money could be earned back in the private sector. It would be destroying that concept entirely.

In my view there is a grave danger, with things such as the IDEA Corp., of getting into loss situations. Dramatic and large ticket items going down the tubes, so to speak, is a problem. There is this matter of conflict about legislative access to information. That conflict will have to be resolved.

The basic reason it has to be resolved is that all of this stuff is very much in vogue. Whenever the convention is held and the new leader emerges from the other side, I am sure the flags will be out waving again. I do not know whether it will be IDEA 85 or what the new name will be. I am unsure who will get this appointment, but I know there will be something like this cranked up once again, because it is a tool of modern government; but it has within it basic structural problems that must be resolved.

I will wind up with a couple of general comments about these two reports. The committee does its work reasonably well. I do not have any illusions. For example, we have a researcher, John Eichmanis, who has worked for some time on the committee. He does the yeoman's work of putting together the briefing material, visiting and talking to the agencies prior to the reviews. If he worked for the Ministry of Natural Resources there would probably be about 200 people underneath him cranking out paper, writing up reports, making telephone calls and doing the itinerary. He does it on his own and he does a good job for the committee. It is not easy for one person to try to serve a total committee to get that agenda out. He has done that and done it consistently.

The members of the committee have been pretty faithful, with one or two exceptions, about setting aside the partisan hat when they enter into reviewing these agencies. We are on the right track. Again, as I said initially, one of the biggest things is simply somebody is paying attention to these agencies these days, and that is particularly useful.

We run across some situations where the agency is perking away there doing not very much, including not very much harm to anybody, and we try to bring that to people's attention. We make a few little controversial recommendations from time to time and we put them in front of the Legislature for debate. That is interesting.

Of these two reports before us this evening, there are two or three really significant things which have to be addressed. There cannot be an agency such as the Alcoholism and Drug Addiction Research Foundation with no funding. If the government wants them to do that kind of a job, it has an obligation to provide them with the financial resources or to indicate clearly ahead of time that there are other ways to recruit financial resources and make that work.

I am not an advocate of closing the regional offices or anything such as that, but I think it is true that an agency such as that needs proper funding. If we are going to have an agency such as the Ontario Status of Women Council, there is no sense having one on a part-time doing half of the work and letting the other half go basis. If we are going to have something such as that, it should be designed to have status. It should be designed to have, for example, a full-time chairperson and it deserves the same status that something such as the Ontario Manpower Commission had.

There is no question about it in my mind. That is precisely what our committee was talking about when it conducted the review. That has not happened. I suppose there will be lots of reasons it has not happened or why it will not happen, but if one wanted to begin with equal pay for work of equal value, one would take someone such as the new chairperson for the Ontario Status of Women Council and see that the per diems were the same as those of all of the other agencies out there. One would put that measure of fairness in there and give them access to resources.

As I have said on a number of occasions, I am a believer in agency reviews. I wish we could do more of it and I wish we could do it tougher, so to speak. I wish we had a few more resources at our disposal to conduct reviews of agencies. But I am happy that at least somebody is beginning the process, and the process is one which the public can come and watch. They have not shown an inclination to do so in large numbers, but at least they have the opportunity. It is okay that these public reviews are a matter of public record.

I am not upset by the idea that we may not have a great vote tonight. The bells will ring and all the members will show up. I pay a small compliment to the government, which I do not do very often. I am quite pleased that in all the agency reviews the ministries have been reasonably faithful in at least replying to the recommendations of the procedural affairs committee.

I am not always convinced we make the proper recommendations. I have no illusions that we do thorough research into every single avenue of work done by these agencies, but at least the government has consistently and regularly given us the courtesy of a reply. When it has been able to accommodate the recommendations of the committee, it has done so. We should further develop that aspect of our parliamentary system in Ontario so that all our committees can review legislation, estimates and the workings of the ministries in the same way this little committee reviews agencies.

This place will work better. This place will be a little more relevant. The people out there who foot the bill for all this nonsense will from time to time get good value for their money. We have reviewed some big agencies in these two reports and we have reviewed some little ones. Some spent a lot of money and some did not spend very much. We have made some recommendations. The government will be well served if it pays some attention to them. The process is probably as important as any of the reports ever put forward.

I am pleased to have been able to serve on the committees that reviewed these two sets of agencies. I hope in the future I will have a chance to do the same thing with other agencies because my general impression is that even the agencies reviewed by the committee are pretty happy. They will feel it was a positive experience by the time the whole thing is over.

I think the committee has been fair in its recommendations, and that is not always easy. I do not think there is anything here that is really going to upset the applecart. On the other hand, there is enough that points out areas of some concern to the committee. There are recommendations about disclosure and about access to information. I would predict they will be the hottest political items in the foreseeable future because problems exist here in Ontario with the IDEA Corp. and in a number of other agencies in this country.

I appreciate the opportunity to speak in the debate this evening. I look forward to continuing to play a part in reviewing these agencies.

Mr. Watson: Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to rise and speak on these reports, particularly on the eighth report at this particular time and on this particular date.

It was the third Thursday in October, although the actual date was October 19, six years ago tonight about this time, that the results of the by-election in Chatham-Kent became known and I became a member of this Legislature.

As I sat here tonight, I realized the member for Oshawa was taking his time and I thought, my goodness, I am going to stand up about the exact hour.

I would like to echo some of the things other speakers have said about the procedural affairs committee in general. In the past six years I have had the opportunity to serve on many committees. The procedural affairs committee is the one on which I most appreciated serving. I have the honour now of being the vice-chairman of that particular committee.

9:10 p.m.

As the member for Oshawa mentioned a few minutes ago, most of us leave our political hats outside when we go into committees and have a down-to-earth discussion, particularly in these reviews of the agencies, boards and commissions with respect to their usefulness, the legislation they do not have that they want, the legislation they have that they perhaps should not have and things of that nature. Therefore, it is one of the very interesting sessions and interesting committees whenever we do review the various agencies, boards and commissions.

I would like to comment on some of the reports we have done, particularly number eight. A couple of these were particularly interesting. I think of the public institutions, the recommendation concerning the Board of Visitors of Homewood Sanitarium. I learned that we had private hospitals in the province. I did not know that until that particular point. I think there may be two in the province, and that happens to be one of them. I understand it was incorporated just over 100 years ago and is a long-standing institution.

I went to another institution in Guelph. Sometimes we did not always speak of that one in the best light in terms of some of the remarks one would make as a college student. On the other hand, I think the particular board we reviewed is one of those that has perhaps outlived its usefulness in that there are other groups that can do it. I do not think the recommendations we made, particularly that one, were earth-shattering, but certainly the things we found out about that institution and the way it operates were to me personally, and I know to committee members, extremely interesting.

We got to the parole board. I was one of those in the committee who raised the concern, and I still have concern, about the relationship between the powers of the parole board and the temporary absence program the ministry runs. One of the recommendations this committee made was that this matter be reviewed because there is bound to be some overlapping.

In view of some of the current news items on the problems we are having with what seems to be a rash of shootings and so forth and with some of the events involving people who are currently on parole, although perhaps not out of our Ontario system. I think this has to be looked at even more. I hope the Ministry of Correctional Services takes this and looks at it fairly closely.

I was particularly interested in our activities and discussions with the Crop Insurance Commission of Ontario. I believe some 47 crops now, if memory serves me correctly, are insured under the crop insurance commission. One of the problems it has in creating paperwork, and I think it is a problem we have in the government, is that every year when it wants to change the rates -- and they are based on actuarial rates; it is a three-way co-operation in crop insurance among the farmers, the provincial government and the federal government -- it requires a regulation, and the regulation has to be filed even though we are changing the rates by only a few cents or something of that nature.

I do not know how the crop insurance commission can get out of this without our changing the legislation. It probably would not be right to give it the authority to set those rates without some sort of legislation. But certainly I think it should at least group these crops, provide or find some way so that we do not have to file independent regulations for every rate that is set for each crop in Ontario. I am sure this can be done by some kind of combination.

Another proposal that I have been a proponent of for many years, long before I came to this Ontario Legislature -- and I realize the problems on the other side of the coin -- deals with the problem of what is commonly called spot coverage in crop insurance. We have a system of spot coverage on winter wheat, as an example. If the member for Brant-Oxford-Norfolk (Mr. Nixon) has a crop of wheat and he has a field and loses five acres to winterkill out of the middle of that field, he gets an allowance for those five acres out of the middle. In other words, he can collect the insurance on that amount. That is really the way we would like it to work.

The problem we have in Kent county and in other areas of the province is that we have farmers who, when they want to expand their farms, cannot buy the farm next door. They have to go 10, 15 or 25 miles away to buy a farm. One of the rules and regulations in crop insurance is that a farmer must insure his entire crop under one contract. For some purposes and some arguments, that is fine and I accept it.

This past summer we had a tremendous variation in the amount of rainfall in an area of 10 miles and in as little as five miles within our area. I live only about five miles outside the city of Chatham. I believe we had about three inches of rain in Chatham one day. I thought, boy, everything has dropped, but by the time I got home I could not believe we had not had a drop.

For the people in Tilbury, those in the riding of the member for Essex North (Mr. Ruston) and those on the west side of the riding of the member for Kent-Elgin (Mr. McGuigan), the yield on soybeans this year was in some cases less than half what it should have been. It is a relatively small area. It is bad if one is affected, but it does not extend all the way down to Lake Erie. It does not extend all the way to Leamington.

It is fine by the time one gets to Blenheim and Ridgetown. If one goes up to Chatham and Dresden, the crops are pretty good. However, there is a small pocket in there. One can picture a farmer having a farm in that area and a farm up in the middle of Dover township. His average is great because he has a bumper yield on one, but he has next to nothing on the other one and crop insurance will not pay him. I think for some crops and some insured hazards we should have insurance on individual fields.

Mr. Nixon: Would that include tobacco?

Mr. Watson: I would include tobacco if, say, a hailstorm hits a farmer's field of tobacco on one farm and not on another. Why should it not when it is out of the control of the individual farmer? I suppose insurance is always supposed to be an act of God. We get into those kind of arguments where the farmer did not spray. The member for Brant-Oxford-Norfolk knows that when a hailstorm goes through, it is generally a fairly narrow swath and, zoom, it goes. We had one about three years ago on the outskirts of Chatham. It went through in a narrow band.

I have an example of the ridiculous thing we can get into, and it does not happen very often. I had a farmer who was sharecropping with one of my city friends. The city friend rented the 15 acres and grew soybeans on shares with the farmer. They insured the soybeans under crop insurance. Along came the hailstorm and, bang, down went the soybeans. There was no question; they were destroyed.

The members can guess what happened. The city sharecropper got paid because that was all the soybeans he had. Because the farmer who was in the business had 100 acres of soybeans down the road which were all right, his average was away up despite those 15 acres and, therefore, he did not qualify under his guaranteed yield.

When the crop insurance system does not permit such a claim I think it is time we reviewed the crop insurance system.

Mr. Nixon: It may take a change in government to fix that.

Mr. Watson: I do not know what it is going to take. We have had a change in Ottawa. Maybe we should apply some pressure there and get this thing changed.

Mr. Nixon: Did the member see what they are doing in Ottawa? They are spending all that money on the ministers' staff.

Mr. Watson: By the way, I am truly sorry the member for Brant-Oxford-Norfolk did not make the Senate. I really thought he was going to be on that list. I thought he was there and I would have applauded that.

Mr. Nixon: There is still time. The honourable member should speak to Brian. Stephen Lewis made it.

Mr. Watson: Yes, Stephen made it. The member for Brant-Oxford-Norfolk has to bide his time because if he goes too soon there would be so few left that the Liberal Party would not be the official opposition any more.

9:20 p.m.

One recommendation the member for Oshawa dealt with in detail and I would like to deal with in some detail concerns the Alcoholism and Drug Addiction Research Foundation and particularly the recommendation we made to phase out the local and regional offices. I thought the member for Oshawa put it rather well when he summed it up.

As a committee, we had the presentation. We did feel that research was what they did extremely well. In the presentation that was made to us, I got the impression, as I think the member for Oshawa did, that we did not get the emphasis on what the regional and local offices were doing, and therefore we said: "What are you doing? You are not doing very much."

I knew some of the things they had been doing, and since we have put out the report I have learned a lot more of the things they have been doing. If when we presented that report I had known all the things I know now, I might have objected to that particular recommendation going in.

Mr. Nixon: The member has had two bad letters from the constituency, has he?

Mr. Watson: No, I have not had two bad letters. However, one of the things I did about a month ago was to appear before the city council of Chatham and make a recommendation that perhaps the city of Chatham should consider a drinking and driving committee. A notice went out across the province, but Chatham did not act on it. I feel fairly strongly about that, and I think we should be doing something in our area.

This week the local office of the addiction research foundation was asked to chair a drinking and driving committee in the city of Chatham. The foundation director was asked to chair it, because that group can give a neutral and objective point of view about drinking and driving. If a policeman is made chairman of it, he has a bias; it is a good bias, but it is worth taking into account. If a crown attorney is made chairman, he has a bias.

I think that group has the ability to provide the chairman for that committee, and I cannot do anything but wish him well. From a selfish point of view, because of the actions in Chatham within the last week, I hope the Ministry of Health will not give too much consideration to that particular recommendation.

We also have an excellent district health council. The district health council in our area has had a lot of good people on it. They have done a lot of good work and their recommendations are objective. Their recommendations are usually followed by the Ministry of Health. Perhaps they have had the publicity and the addiction research foundation has been less than spectacular in its publicity. I guess it may not need it or should not have the publicity.

The addiction research foundation certainly has set up many in-plant alcoholic programs. It does not seem to matter which section of society we deal with, our various industries have problems. Many of our larger companies are dealing with these alcoholic problems, and the addiction research foundation helps them to get them on the right foot with programs as well as with community efforts.

I want to comment and merely identify myself with the comments of the member for Oshawa on the committee's actions on why that particular recommendation was there. I was one of those who, if we had our druthers, would rather not have put that in. I think if the addiction research foundation were doing it again, it would make a little different presentation to us on its activities on a regional and local office basis.

One of the interesting boards -- and one gets involved personally with these boards; this is one board I have had something to do with over the past six years -- happens to be the Board of Funeral Services. It is interesting for two reasons. One is that the chairman for many years was Mr. Wilf Scott from Woodbridge. Woodbridge happens to be my home town, and the Scotts were family friends and certainly well known to our family; their children were the same age as I was, and I grew up with them. That board always had attention, because when I visited Woodbridge Rotary Club, as I have done on many occasions, Mr. Scott, who is a member, always used to take me aside and tell me what was going on in the Board of Funeral Services.

When Mr. Scott left that job, the position went to Mr. Eric Nicholls, who happens to be a funeral director from Wallaceburg, in my constituency; therefore, I used to be brought up to date. Once or twice I had the opportunity to ride the train from Chatham to Toronto with Mr. Nicholls as he was coming to a meeting and I was coming to the Legislature. Again, I got brought up to date on all the things happening on the Board of Funeral Services.

For those reasons, it was with some personal interest that I heard of the board's activities. We realized the board had its problems. We were impressed with the way they were resolving their problems. We know there are still problems, particularly in terms of their authority and in terms of licensing new people, getting these people educated at community colleges and things of that nature.

Another matter that came up with respect to the Board of Funeral Services was what seemed to be a phenomenon whose time has come, and we recommended that the Ministry of Consumer and Commercial Relations amend the Prearranged Funeral Services Act to provide for the bonding of funeral directors. We wanted to ensure -- this was my concern -- that people who put money down on deposit with a funeral director got the value for their money, or their estate did, and that it did not disappear on them somehow.

In terms of a philosophy that is going across a lot of industries today, this one has a lot of support. We have seen this sort of thing in the travel industry; unfortunately, it has had to be used two or three times, but the fund is replenished. We have seen it in the agricultural industry, where yesterday was the starting date for the financial protection for corn and soybeans. We had a red meat plan; that was discussed for a long time, but we could not move and take action on it. Unfortunately, it took a bankruptcy in my part of Ontario to bring it to a head, and all of a sudden it proceeded. We have seen it this year with the vegetable crops, which now have a financial protection aspect to them and a fund established in case somebody goes into bankruptcy.

We have the suggestion about the insurance agencies at the present time. The Ministry of Consumer and Commercial Relations is asking for suggestions about how one can be assured, if one buys insurance, that there is money there to pay the claims should the company involved go into bankruptcy or receivership or otherwise not have the money to pay.

The same kind of principle is involved in the case of the Board of Funeral Services. Bonding is what was recommended, because the board told us that was probably the cheapest way for funeral directors to do that. I was not concerned how they did it, whether they established a separate fund or whether they went into bonding. My concern was that they did something on that issue.

I want to wind up my comments by stating again that I have appreciated my activities on the procedural affairs committee. I appreciate the other members. It is one of the areas where we look at problems, whether they be agencies, boards or commissions, on the basis of what is best for the province rather than what is best for "my party." Over the years, we have come up with reports and recommendations that have been meaningful. When we do it in that way we are respected by all sides of the House.

9:30 p.m.

The Deputy Speaker: I believe the member had one last thought he wanted to share with us from that committee.

Mr. Watson: Pay tribute to the Speaker; was that it? I will be glad to pay tribute to the Speaker, particularly if the member for London North (Mr. Van Horne) is going to be the next speaker. Is that the idea?

Motion agreed to.

REPORT, SELECT COMMITTEE ON THE OMBUDSMAN (CONTINUED)

Resuming the adjourned debate on the motion for adoption of the recommendations contained in the 11th report of the select committee on the Ombudsman.

Mr. Van Horne: Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to be able to say a few words on this 11th report of the select committee on the Ombudsman, dated March 1984. I say so because in a sense I perceive this to be a pivotal report with respect to the history of the Office of the Ombudsman and the reports made as a result of the establishing of that office.

I do not think one could do justice to the whole theme of the Ombudsman without first elaborating a little bit on that opening comment of this being pivotal. I say so because the history of ombudsmanship in this province is one that began with the reign of the late Arthur Maloney. In a sense I hesitate to use the word "reign," and yet it is most appropriate because he handled the office as the first Ombudsman of this province in a kingly way.

There are critics, who have become silent of recent days because of the passing of Mr. Maloney, who chose to be critical of the approach he made to the office. Yet if one sits back in cool reflective thought and considers that criticism, one would have to agree it was more a criticism of the trappings of the office than of the office itself.

Without question, the first Ombudsman determined to be a spokesperson for the little man. He established routines that were sound routines. Some of the regulations or trappings that followed along after them became a touch cumbersome, but in general the first Ombudsman of this province served the citizens of this province, the Legislature and that new function in a very positive way.

From that comment, I want to move to the second Ombudsman in the person of Mr. Morand, who attempted in a very sincere way to bring the trappings into line and to address the Ombudsman's office to the detail of work that flowed from the many investigations that he became involved in. It was at this time, I think, that the Legislature started to zero in more on the office and on the Ombudsman as something the Legislature should be concerned about to be sure we were not getting too involved with the mechanics of operation.

We are all aware of some of the disagreements the select committee had with Mr. Morand about the procedures of operation. I believe it was unfortunate for him that some of his staff were so protective of him and so determined to make sure every t was crossed and every i was dotted that for a short period of time the Legislature seemed to fall into second place. That brought some unfortunate exchanges of views and ideas about the whole role of Ombudsman into the public arena, into the arena as shaped by the media. To an extent and for a short period of time the office suffered and the Legislature suffered.

That was resolved, however. It was resolved in the final analysis when the second Ombudsman chose to retire, and through the period of an interim Ombudsman, the government in its wisdom reflected on what the select committee had been saying, the select committee being the voice of the Legislature for all three parties. Then, as this 11th report was presented, we were aware of the appointment of the third Ombudsman, Dr. Hill.

I think the select committee plays a unique role in this whole legislative process, because every member of this chamber is an Ombudsman. The role we play in trying to accommodate the concerns, the problems and the red tape our constituents bring to us is one that is funnelled into this office and is now available to every member of this House, be he a back-bencher, a front-bencher, a cabinet minister or whatever. We all, as ombudsmen, reach that point when we have to lean on someone else, someone with a little more ability or expertise; this is really where the Office of Ombudsman comes to serve us all. When I say "serve us all," I mean we then turn the funnel around and reflect on all the people in Ontario.

In this 11th report there is an indication, if one compares it with the previous 10 reports, that the work is starting to become more refined; that is, the work of the Office of the Ombudsman and the work of the committee. In the early stages, as committee members looking at the office, we were concerned about the number of hours and the number of days it took to resolve a case. We got hung up to a degree on the mechanics of the operation. I think there is a reflection here, and certainly there will be in the next report a further indication, that things are starting to narrow down and become more refined.

I am pleased to have had the opportunity to be a member of this committee because of all the committees of the Legislature, it is one of the less partisan committees. All three political parties are represented in a way in which we see that reflection of evenhandedness. There has been precious little acrimony, back-biting or fighting among the ideologies that are represented in this chamber.

9:40 p.m.

In a sense, I also take a bit in pride in observing the way this committee presented itself to a conference held in British Columbia a year ago. The British Columbia Ombudsman, Dr. Karl Friedmann, invited us along as a unique entity in the Dominion of Canada. Not every province has an Ombudsman and not every country has an Ombudsman, and certainly not every political entity has a select committee working along with, at times overseeing and at times acting as a reflector for the concerns of, that office.

We, the members of that committee, felt we were rather privileged to be asked to attend and to be part of the group. There were many people there from outside Canada. There were people from Europe, Australia and the United States. When I say people, generally they were staff or ombudspersons. There were no other people there acting in the capacity we were acting in as members of a select committee on the Ombudsman here in Ontario.

We were privileged to be there. The people looked at us as a body that had something unique to offer and contribute in discussion. I say with considerable pride that the chairman of the committee, the member for Leeds (Mr. Runciman), who was our chairman then and is still our chairman, took part in the panel discussions as the official spokesman, although the rest of the committee were able to chip in. We were very pleased with the presentation made by the honourable member and we were also pleased with the opportunity to attend.

This 11th report contains a handful of recommendations on specific cases. These are found at the very back of the report, on page 47. If one looks at the eight recommendations, one can see that four of them -- half the cases -- are related to the Workers' Compensation Board. The others are spread around with the Ministry of Education, the Housing and Urban Development Association of Canada, the Ministry of the Attorney General.

It is significant to observe that half the recommendations deal with one of the Ombudsman's basic problems, and that is its relationship with the Workers' Compensation Board. That reflects the relationship of most of the members of this chamber with his or her constituency problems, the majority of which in the past have related to the Workers' Compensation Board.

Even though it is not technically proper, I am pleased to allude to the 12th report that has just been dealt with by the committee and which will be presented to the chamber either late this fall or early in the spring. That report will reflect, as this one does, a refining or boiling down of the problems the Ombudsman has passed on and which we are dealing with as a committee.

I see good things happening. It might be a contradiction in thought to say that the first Ombudsman and the second Ombudsman each did his thing in seeing the role or the office evolve. They tried their level best, they got things going, but there were problems; I would say basically mechanical problems. This select committee and the reports have tried to resolve those and bring them into focus for the chamber. They are now narrowing down. I started by saying that we are at a pivotal point and I am proud and pleased to be part of it.

I will conclude by saying that this report is one that will be looked back on as the turning point in the relationship of the office, the committee and this chamber in serving the concerns of the people in our province who run into red tape with various ministries, those people who need the Office of the Ombudsman.

Mr. Philip: Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to participate in the debate on this, the 11th report. Whenever we deal with these reports, I am struck with the thought that they would be more significant if we had an opportunity to debate and discuss them sooner after we finished them. In a sense we are dealing with a report that is now somewhat stale; indeed, some of the very ideas in it have -- much to our encouragement -- been implemented by the new Ombudsman. Of course, we will have an opportunity to compliment him on his excellent work in his new role in the debate on the next report.

One of the first things in part I, the introduction, talks about an excellent conference that was hosted by Dr. Karl Friedmann in Vancouver. One of the highlights of that conference was a panel in which the late Arthur Maloney participated.

I think all of us over the years, whether we occasionally agreed or disagreed with Arthur Maloney, had to see him as one of the great men in the development of the Ombudsman movement, and I was struck almost a year later by some words at a different conference, one in Stockholm, by the South Australian Ombudsman, R. D. Bakewell. He said, "The most effective tool of an Ombudsman's independence is his ability to publicize the outcome of an investigation." That particular Ombudsman went on to say, "The Ombudsman does so by the use of separate press releases, annual reports and generally going public with the results of those investigations."

I guess Arthur Maloney knew how to use those. He knew how to bring about change by ensuring that his decisions, made in an independent way, would be released, that he and the media would put pressure on and let the chips fall where they might.

Sometimes it took real courage to do that kind of thing; it took an independence of mind. Some of us did not always agree with what Arthur Maloney was about, but one had to admire that he had the guts to come forward and use the media to best advantage to correct the injustices he saw it as his mandate to correct.

One of the interesting things in the Ombudsman committee report, again on the first page, in dealing with the conference in Vancouver, was the excellent work done by Dr. Karl Friedmann. There are certain ombudsmen who will be remembered for a long time. Arthur Maloney was one of those; another is Dr. Karl Friedmann. I would like to go into some of his concepts and ideas in a later debate on the 12th report, because he gave an excellent and very comprehensive paper in Stockholm.

At the present time, one of the things that was very thought-provoking in Vancouver when one visited Dr. Friedmann's offices and read his reports was that basically he was saying -- and a couple of other ombudsmen there were saying the same thing -- that the role of the Ombudsman should be less to do case work to solve individual problems and more to concentrate on the system.

In an analogous way we have the same thing with the Provincial Auditor or the Auditor General of Canada. Surely the most important thing is not that he identify a particular injustice and correct that one injustice but rather that he identify the system that is wrong, the system of maladministration, and correct it so that further injustices do not happen.

9:50 p.m.

Dr. Friedmann in his reports, which he shared with us in Vancouver, showed that he had been able to do that. In fact, he was looking not just at solving an individual case of injustice but rather at identifying an administrative fault. One of the interesting and very encouraging things in the new Ombudsman's 1983-84 report was that he, in fact, has taken that systemic approach. He has not taken on the whole government. It is a slow process. Indeed, what he has done is identify areas in which he thought had the most possibilities of identifying systemic problems.

In his report he has come down, as Friedmann has done, with certain principles of administration. One can read the report and clearly identify them and, indeed, any ministry could use them eventually almost as a training manual, if we were to compile them all together, for top public servants, and say, "This is the kind of thing we have to watch out for or we are going to have individual cases of injustice resulting."

I think one of the interesting cases in this was the case of the Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing refusing to compensate a group of people it had identified, or maybe even named, or indicated were speculators. The two New Democrats on the committee found ourselves in the unusual predicament of saying:

"We happen to think these people may be what you say they are or what you are implying they are, but that does not change what it is we are about. What we are about is identifying a systemic problem. There is a systems problem here committed by the Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing; namely, the ministry, in setting up its system, did not take into account the making of rules so people could not manipulate and take excessive profits through speculative gain in this particular instance."

We cannot close the gate and retroactively take away from people something they have done legally. We cannot take the heat off the government for maladministration by simply saying, "These are bad guys." We cannot decide, as the Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing did in the case of these 18 people or companies in the Pickering case: "These guys were just a little smart and they took us. They found a loophole." We cannot get away from saying: "We made a mistake. We are going to correct the mistake. We are going to say we are sorry, but you found the hole and you got through and we are going to see that the hole is not created the next time we come to a similar problem."

We were faced with agreeing with the Ombudsman. We were saying: "There is no proof that these people are speculators, or that all of them are speculators, but even if they are, it is the Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing that made the mistake. The ministry should have set down the rules, but it did not. We cannot take the heat off the responsibility of the ministry by simply saying we do not like the people who took advantage of it."

I think we had a problem in dealing with that and in dealing with one or two other cases. The problem was that we considered and we let get in our way and into our thinking a whole bunch of extraneous facts, considerations and innuendoes that had very little to do with the case. One of the things the new Ombudsman has implemented that, unfortunately, was not available to us at that time but that has made things so much simpler for the committee, is a procedure whereby the Ombudsman and the ministry affected agree to a statement of fact.

I think if we had had that in the case of the 18 people in the Pickering case, perhaps the focus of that debate would have been simply on the facts. The personalities, who they were, who they might be or whatever, might have had less importance. I do not know, but I think it might have affected the decision and the committee might have found in favour of the Ombudsman and against that ministry.

The new Ombudsman has implemented that and I think it is a good procedure for dealing with cases such as this where extraneous sorts of things may affect the decision of members who, like any jury, are affected by who they think the participants are in a particular problem.

One of the other advantages of the new Ombudsman and the Ombudsman's new procedure is that one of the interesting things that happens, and they have confirmed this, is the moment both sides -- the Ombudsman who feels a particular client, citizen or corporation is offended and the offending ministry -- sit down and start agreeing on what the essential facts are, often the problem disappears. The misunderstanding is a misunderstanding of what exactly the facts are in the case.

Indeed, Dr. Hill admitted there perhaps were a number of cases that did not have to come to the committee because of the new procedure he has implemented. That is a tremendous advantage and Dr. Hill is to be congratulated for that.

What we have in this report is kind of the edge. Before Mr. Morand left we were arguing about some of these things, some of these procedures. As Dr. Friedmann had done, there was the idea of looking for a systemic approach, which has now been implemented by the new Ombudsman, and the idea of procedures that can best identify what the real facts are and eliminate external factors that may cloud the judgement.

We are in a new era. I think it is rewarding that many of the things some of us were striving for in the committee, as in this report, have now been implemented so excellently by the new Ombudsman. It is encouraging that this has happened.

Lest the government think that because I am paying so many compliments to Dr. Hill I have ignored the way in which he was appointed, I should assure the members that I still think, as the report points out, that even though we have had an excellent appointment in this case -- one all of us can support and one all of us are overjoyed with as a result of his first few months in office -- none the less, looking in Vancouver at the way Dr. Friedmann was appointed, we cannot help but say there is a better way of appointing an Ombudsman than the system that was used in this excellent appointment.

With the appointment of Dr. Friedmann, we saw the government screen hundreds of applicants, short-list them to about 10 and then the committee had to come to a consensus as to who the Ombudsman should be. The members will notice I did not say the committee had to come to a vote, but rather that it had to come to a consensus. In the case of Friedmann, they made an excellent choice, although the latest government may be having second thoughts about some of the systemic inquiries in which Dr. Friedmann finds himself.

One of the things the report talks about is still an outstanding problem. We requested in the 10th report that, "The Attorney General table during the 32nd Parliament of the Legislature a bill amending or otherwise dealing with the Ombudsman's Act, having regard to the matters contained in the draft bill and policy submission provided by the Ombudsman..."

We are still waiting for that legislation. With the advent of the new Ombudsman, it would be appropriate to have that bill before us, to go to committee and to have the insight of the new Ombudsman in relation to the new legislation and the changes that are necessary.

10 p.m.

If I have something negative or regretful to say, it is about recommendation 2. Recommendation 2 has still not been implemented. If I may summarize the essence of it, we found the Workers' Compensation Board to be playing word games with the committee and the Ombudsman. The Ombudsman had taken the position that the board had not complied with the committee's recommendation. Members will recall that in its 10th report the committee asked that the Workers' Compensation Board reconsider its decision.

It should be fairly clear to the Workers' Compensation Board, if they read Hansard and considered their own experience with the committee, that the intention of the committee was that they reconsider and change their position. Instead of doing that, the Workers' Compensation Board said, "We have reconsidered and we stick to our original position."

That kind of word game was irritating not only to the Ombudsman but also to the committee. The committee said, "The committee will expect hereafter when it considers recommendations from the Ombudsman that the precise nature of the result intended will be explained to the committee in order that any recommendation it may decide to make can be framed accordingly."

It is just not the Ombudsman's words. It is not just the committee mistaking the words. It was fairly clear. The Workers' Compensation Board knew exactly what the committee was asking for and what the Workers' Compensation Board was asking for. We used a polite way to say: "You fellows had better understand that we do not agree with you. We want you to reconsider it and we want you to change your decision." Because we did not say, "We want you to change your decision or reverse your decision," they took advantage and tried to find a loophole.

That kind of thing irritates members of the committee. It also irritates the Ombudsman and it thwarts credibility. I would rather the Workers' Compensation Board said: "No way. We are not going to implement this. We strongly disagree" and come forward in a straightforward manner instead of playing word games with the committee and with the Ombudsman.

Another problem we identified is found on page 27, a game played by the Ministry of Consumer and Commercial Relations. I worried about the fact that this government and other governments increasingly are hiding behind tribunals and quasi-judicial bodies without giving adequate direction and without giving adequate guidelines. This is the case in the Housing and Urban Development Association of Canada home warranty program.

If there was ever a bureaucratic, bumbling organization set up by this Legislature, it is the HUDAC home warranty program. Any of us who have ever appeared before it know the whole thing is stacked to try to discourage the person who is making a claim and to intimidate anybody who would dare appeal.

There is the little guy up there, and HUDAC's lawyer is cross-examining an ordinary citizen and questioning his motives and so forth. Any of us who have been through that know it is a devastating experience for the participants. Instead of dealing with the report and the request by the Ombudsman and by the committee, the ministry declined to take any direct steps since the plan is administered by HUDAC.

I say to members that the government cannot get away from its responsibilities of seeing that justice is done to its citizens by hiding behind these tribunals. Surely if the system is wrong, if the process is wrong, the minister has to advise that tribunal and change that. Of course, we deal very forcefully with that and show exactly the problem in this specific instance of HUDAC.

The committee recommended that the ministry and HUDAC take appropriate steps to provide for payment to the complainant of his statutory entitlement to compensation under the Ontario new home warranties act. In the circumstances of the case, the committee considered the sum of $20,000 appropriate payment. I am pleased to see the ministry accepted that and implemented the recommendation.

The thing that concerned me most was the ministry's taking a stand of hands off. There was basic injustice there and the ministry should have got hold of HUDAC and said: "Look, you are not going to hide by saying you are exempt. We are not going to hide you by saying we do not have some responsibility."

We are pleased that a majority of the recommendations on schedule 1 have been implemented. Recommendation 1, as I understand, was implemented. Recommendation 2, which I just talked to, is not being, and I am disappointed. I am pleased to see the Minister of Labour (Mr. Ramsay) is here at least to answer to that.

I am not quite sure whether the Minister of Education (Miss Stephenson) is coming in to deal with recommendation 3. I would like to have some comments from someone on where that is. Recommendation 4 was not implemented, but we expect it soon will be. At least we keep expecting the Attorney General (Mr. McMurtry) to come forward with it. All the other recommendations, numbers 5 to 8, have been implemented.

I look forward with enthusiasm to the new ideas that will come with the new legislation. We will be talking about a number of things in future reports. No doubt the ministry will be thinking of these when the new legislation comes in.

For example, it has been suggested the Ombudsman should not only make recommendations but also prosecute and reverse decisions. In Finland and Sweden the ombudsmen have the right to prosecute. That is one of the things that has come out of some of the conferences we have been able to attend.

In 1978 the Commonwealth ombudsman raised the issue of whether it would be appropriate for an ombudsman to act as a general counsel for citizens seeking a determination of their legal rights vis-à-vis a government. It was even suggested such appeals could be decided by the ombudsman in his office.

Our Ombudsman could become a general policy adviser to government in this regard, but he could also act as a legal advocate in cases where a specific right needed to be tested. As I pointed out in my private member's bill, in our own jurisdiction the Ombudsman could be made responsible for the protection of citizens' privacy and also for the right to access to certain government information. Unfortunately, in bringing down Bill 80, the government has not seen fit to give the Ombudsman these powers.

Those are some of the issues we will no doubt be talking about with the new Ombudsman, who has already implemented many of the things we in this party and I specifically have been asking for. We look forward to debating the next report.

Mr. Runciman: Mr. Speaker, I would like to make a few brief comments on the report.

The Vancouver trip which the committee made to attend the Canadian conference was most worth while. From a personal point of view, it was quite a privilege and an honour to have the opportunity to participate with Mr. Arthur Maloney in a session in the program dealing with the Ombudsman as an officer of the Legislature and how ombudsmen and legislatures relate to each other.

It was the first opportunity I had to meet Mr. Maloney. All honourable members of the House know the late Mr. Maloney's reputation as a member of the legal community and as the first Ombudsman for Ontario. It was a great honour for me. All the members of the committee had the opportunity to sit down with Mr. Maloney at a social occasion following the session and get to know some of his views on the office. It certainly was a beneficial and rewarding experience to have that opportunity prior to his demise.

10:10 p.m.

I also want to mention the northern trip, which was certainly of benefit to the committee and of benefit to the Legislature in the long run in that it gave all the members of the committee an opportunity to have a greater understanding of the problems experienced by the people of the north and especially in relationship to their dealings with the Office of the Ombudsman.

The northern trip certainly gave us new experiences. When we were in Kapuskasing, we had to get up at 4:30 in the morning to catch a plane. We could not shave or shower; everything was frozen solid.

Mr. Van Horne: Including the member for High Park-Swansea (Mr. Shymko).

Mr. Runciman: He was frozen before the heat went off, or solid anyway.

In any event, it was a most enjoyable sojourn. I know all of us came away from that trip with a very positive feeling about northern Ontario, and we are very much looking forward to an opportunity in the near future to visit northwestern Ontario to complete our investigation of the lifestyle and situations faced by the people of the north and how the Ombudsman's office can assist them.

We also had the first opportunity in the past session, and it is dealt with in this report, of handling the estimates of the Ombudsman. As members know, that has been a recommendation of the committee since it came into being. Without a doubt, our differences of opinion with Mr. Morand brought the question to a boil. As a result, the committee is now responsible for the estimates, which I think is appropriate. We dealt with the estimates for the second time this year. It is certainly of benefit, not only to the committee and the Legislature but also to the Ombudsman's office, to be dealing with a committee that has some expertise in the operations of that office.

The member for Etobicoke (Mr. Philip) mentioned the Workers' Compensation Board playing word games in a particular case. I simply want to indicate that although I agree with him to a certain extent in that situation, I think there was fault on both sides. The committee indicated quite clearly that the Ombudsman in his recommendations must be more specific in the future with respect to what the office wishes to see accomplished by the recommendation it makes to the committee. If it is vague and there is some degree of uncertainty, the committee really questions whether it has the latitude to go beyond the recommendation as spelled out by the Ombudsman.

We indicated clearly that if the Ombudsman has some specific goal he wishes to achieve as a result of a recommendation he is making to the committee, he should be much more specific in the wording of that recommendation. The Workers' Compensation Board took that particular recommendation quite literally; I do not know whether we can fault them for doing so. As we spelled out in the report: if the Ombudsman wants a specific result, he had better be specific in his recommendation.

The other thing I want to mention is that Frank McArdle, who was the temporary Ombudsman for some period of time, is deserving of some reference by this committee. In fact, he was put into a rather difficult position. He served quite well in that role during the time he was temporary Ombudsman for Ontario. For the most part, members were quite pleased with his performance in that role and satisfied with the co-operation we received from him while he was temporary Ombudsman. I think I speak for all members of the committee in wishing him well in the future.

The only thing I can add in winding up is that we welcome the new Ombudsman, Dr. Hill. Our initial dealings with him have been very positive, and we look forward to an excellent relationship with that office in the years ahead.

Mr. Van Horne: Mr. Speaker, on a point of privilege: In my comments I neglected to make reference to the committee's trip to the north, as the chairman pointed out just a moment ago, and I would like to add to his comments that we were served well by one of our committee members. At that time the member for Cochrane North (Mr. Piché) was a gracious host to us. In addition to that, the hospitality we had in our visit to Attawapiskat, Moosonee, Moose Factory and Port Albany, aside from the more southerly points, was extremely gracious, positive and everything else good that one can say.

The native people of the far north treated us most kindly and made us aware of some of our shortcomings in a most positive way. Throughout the whole exercise, the representative of the Ombudsman working out of the North Bay office, Mr. Gilles Morin, was a good guide and host to us.

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank you for the opportunity to add those few words and to add to the record something positive about the visit we had to the north. It really was good.

Mr. Philip: Mr. Speaker, I might add that I thought Mr. Gilles Morin showed he had a mastery and knowledge of and an empathy for the north.

One of the interesting things we found was that people did not distinguish between the federal government and the provincial government. They knew that if they went to the Ombudsman he was the person who would try to sort them through the bureaucracy. I think there is a lesson to be learned in that -- and I think the federal government has made a serious mistake -- and that is that you have one ombudsman; you do not have a fragmented series of ombudsmen.

While we saw this in that microcosm of the north, I think it is something we could well look at here in Ontario. We should not set up a whole bunch of separate tribunal type of organizations. That is one of the points I was trying to make on the freedom of information act.

The other thing that is significant about the north is that the new Ombudsman has expressed a particular interest in providing services there to cover all of the north. We saw only one portion of it, and we look forward to going up into Nipigon and that area of the north with the Ombudsman; I know the new Ombudsman has expressed a particular interest in doing that also.

Mr. Runciman: Mr. Speaker, I will make this very brief. In case some of the constituents of the member for High Park-Swansea read the record, they might misinterpret what I said earlier. I want to assure them that this particular member acted most responsibly during his stay in Kapuskasing, despite any rumours to the contrary.

There is another thing I want to mention. The member for London North made some comments in tossing bouquets, and this may be my last opportunity in this role; who knows? I simply want to say that it has been very much a pleasure to serve as chairman of the select committee because of the approach that all three parties have taken during the deliberations. It is truly a nonpartisan committee.

It has been most enjoyable, and I think that is exemplified by the relationship between the chairman and the vice-chairman, the member for London North. He has done an excellent job in supporting me in my role, and I think it typifies the kind of relationship that has developed during the past three and a half years on that committee.

Mr. Kerrio: What is Her Majesty going to say about that?

Mr. Runciman: She may have some problems with that; that is right. It has been an excellent relationship and a very worthwhile experience.

10:20 p.m.

Mr. Shymko: Mr. Speaker, may I just add some comments?

Mr. Speaker: Not really. I have given extreme latitude to all honourable members in allowing them to speak more than once on the same topic. I did that only because of --

Mr. Shymko: Mr. Speaker, on a point of privilege: On behalf of all the members of the select committee, I want to congratulate the quality of leadership provided by the chairman of the committee. The success of the select committee's performance is due to a large extent to the leadership provided by the chairman of that committee.

Motion agreed to.

The House adjourned at 10:20 p.m.